A Series of Lessons

On The

Book of Hebrews
Volume One

Given by
CHARLES R. RODMAN
In 1942

Published by
The Apostolic Faith
6615 SE 52nd AVE
Portland, Oregon 97206
 . . . Preface . . .

This series of lessons on the Book of Hebrews was presented by the late
Rev. Charles Rodman to a class of young people in the fall of 1942.
Brother Rodman was graduated from Princeton University, and his studies
in Greek and Hebrew helped him in his studies of the Scriptures. However, it was
not until years later, when he came into a born-again experience of salvation,
that he really felt he could understand God’s living Word.
Although he had been an ordained minister in a large denomination, when
he heard the testimonies of men whose lives had been transformed by the
spiritual experience of the new birth he realized that he had never known that
transforming power of God. Obedient to the heavenly vision, he prayed through
to salvation, sanctification, and the baptism of the Holy Ghost. His life was then
wholly dedicated to the Lord’s service until the call came to cease from his labors
and come up higher to receive his reward for faithful service.

[ See "Tract 43" A Minister’s Problem Solved ]

The Apostolic Faith

 Contents

Topic Page

The Purpose of the Bible……………………………………………..1

The Exaltation of Jesus Christ………………………………………12

The Old and N ew Dispensations……………………………………26

Christ’s Humiliation and Exaltation………………………………….34

The Apostleship and Priesthood of Christ………………………… 45

An Exhortation t o Steadfastness…………………………………… 53

Jesus Christ, Prophet , Priest and King……………………………..65

Fighting the Fi ght of Faith…………………………………………….77

God’s Promise to Abraham…………………………………………..83

The Priesthood of Christ and of Melchisedec………………………91

 The Purpose of the Bible
-----Lesson One-----

The Plan of Redemption

As one reads the Bible and applies himself to the study of it; he discovers
much history in it; but it is not a book of history. We find many writings by
different Hebrew authors; but it is not a book of Hebrew literature. Many portions
are devoted to prophecy; but it is not a prophetic book altogether. And neither is
it a book of morals, although we find many precepts laid down in it.
The chief theme running through the Bible from start to finish is the
relationship of man to God. It is a plan unfolded for man’s redemption, and shows
man’s relationship to God in the plan. It also brings out Jesus Christ above every
person throughout the Bible, inasmuch as He is the Redeemer. The purpose of
the Book, and the theme which is chiefly presented, is God’s plan of redemption.
It is not presented in theological form. The study of theology is divided first
into what is called “theology proper,” the study of the Godhead. Next comes
anthropology, or a study of man. That includes the fall of man. The next division
is called “soteriology,” or the redemption of man. Then comes “eschatology,” or
the study of last things, including the prophetic portions.
But that is not the way God proceeds. He begins with historical records of
events. His dealings with men, and particularly with His own people. Then comes
His revelation of Himself to man. Thus even in historical incidents and God’s
dealing with man we discover that God is presenting to man a plan of salvation.
Many people have missed the mark entirely by misinterpreting the Bible.
They ask questions such as why are we not told more about other races than the
Jews? If it were a history of the world we probably would be; but it is not a history
of the world. The criticisms that are launched against the Bible are made largely
because men have misinterpreted the meaning of it. What the Bible is concerned
with is God’s plan of redemption for man; and God sticks to His theme.
We find the plan of redemption unfolding step by step down through the
ages; first the blade, then the ear, and then the full kernel in the ear. That is
God’s plan; and with every step God has given a fuller revelation of Himself, a
fuller knowledge of the plan of salvation. We happen to be living in an age when
there is much light, when God has showed forth His plan wonderfully. While it is
not yet full, we are nearing the time when it will be.
Fellowship Broken
God revealed Himself to Adam from the very beginning. It was not difficult
because Adam was in perfect communion and fellowship with God. There was
nothing to mar that fellowship. But that state of things did not last long. Adam lost
the state wherein he was created because he transgressed God’s
commandment, and his entire nature was thus changed. The sinful nature came
in; and instead of man’s being under the dominion of God as he had been, he

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came under the dominion of Satan. No man can obey Satan without coming
under his dominion. “Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to
obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of
obedience unto righteousness?” (Romans 6:16). Not only that, but a great
change was wrought in Adam’s nature. It became degenerate, and communion
with God was broken off; there was no longer any fellowship. There was
estrangement, a barrier, immediately.
In the beginning, Adam was in the normal state that God intended man to
be: in perfect fellowship with God. Can you imagine anything being more normal
than that man should know God and be in communion with Him and have perfect
fellowship with his creator?
Not only with Adam, but with all his posterity, that barrier which was
brought about by sin had to be broken through in order for God to reveal Himself
again to man. There had to be a way of approach devised by which man could
get back to God and be redeemed from his lost state. Practically, what
redemption means is “being restored to God.” Man could do nothing by himself.
He had rendered himself helpless by his disobedience. So if any steps were to
be taken it had to be on the part of God; thus God took the initiative.
God had made a covenant with Adam: the covenant embracing the terms
and conditions upon Adam’s part, and promises upon God’s part. This covenant
came before the fall. Adam was put on probation. He would remain in the Garden
and God would bless him on condition that he would not eat of the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil. Right there a covenant was established between
God and Adam.
The Antediluvian Period
We have in the Old Testament dispensation the various periods or stages
of God’s plan of redemption unfolded. The first period was the antediluvian
period – which means “before the flood.” At that early state it was evidently
revealed to man how he must approach God: through the shedding of blood.
When Abel approached God he came with the shed blood. It showed that God
had revealed to Abel, through the Spirit, that in order to approach Him it was
necessary to have a sacrifice and the shedding of blood. There was that much
revealed in that period of God’s plan of salvation.
It is evident, also, that God dealt with the hearts of men, because it says
that men began to call upon the name of the Lord. Thus there was not a
complete absence of the knowledge of God. They had a certain light and were
making approach to God; but in spite of that, sin had the upper hand and the
result was that the early generations became so sinful that God determined to
blot them out. Only one family remained true to Him. That was Noah and his
family of three sons and their wives. The entire race was blotted out; only Noah
and his family were kept alive through the Flood.
We find that there were some godly characters before the Flood, among
them Enoch. He walked so close to God that he was translated. He became a
type of the translated Church. It was also said of Noah that he was righteous and
walked with God. He was a perfect man in his generation. In order for these men
to have attained to such stages of spirituality, God had revealed Himself to a

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considerable extent. But there was no fixed place of worship. They worshipped
God by erecting individual or family altars. When Noah came out of the ark his
first step was to build an altar unto the Lord and offer sacrifices: here was the
shedding of blood. Immediately upon Noah’s offering his sacrifice unto the Lord,
God promised that He would never again destroy the world by water. This was
God’s covenant with Noah.
The Patriarchal Period
With Noah began the patriarchal period, which continued until Moses. It is
called the patriarchal period because the fathers were heads of tribes or families.
A patriarch outside the line of Abraham who is mentioned at this time was Job, a
great man of the East – a man who had broken through to a knowledge of God
outside the usual line of redemption which God had ordained.
God called another patriarch, Abraham, out of Haran and separated him
from idol worshippers. A little later we find God making a covenant with him: that
all nations should be blessed through him. It was sealed by the rite of
circumcision. That mark signified, spiritually, sanctification. And if it was the mark
which marked God’s people in those days, then the spiritual work also marks
God’s people today. The Israelites were a people separated unto God, and
Abraham was made the representative of that people.
Paul said: “What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of
circumcision? Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed
the oracles of God” (Romans 3:1, 2). That is, the Lord used that nation as a
channel to bring His plan of salvation to the entire Gentile world.
If the law was to be given, it had to be unfolded in some line of people with
whom God was in close touch. All the time there was this barrier of sin that had
arisen. That barrier had to be overcome in order for man to be reached;
therefore, He chose this people for that purpose. Why did He choose the Jews?
Because of Abraham’s righteous life; because He found a man whom He could
trust and who had faith in God. It was not an arbitrary choice. He called Abraham
and Abraham responded. If Abraham had failed to respond to the call of God, He
would have selected someone else.
Down through the history of Christianity, God has called certain ones, and
some of them have miserably failed of that calling. It was true in Biblical times
and since Biblical times. But Abraham was one who did not fail. God called him
and he filled the place for which God had ordained him. For that reason he
became the father of the faithful, not only of the people that God was to set aside
as a channel of His plan of redemption, but for all who would believe on Jesus.
He was an example of those who believed God.
The covenant with Noah gave God’s assurance of preserving life. There
was nothing in that covenant concerning eternal redemption. But God selected
Abraham for the purpose of revealing to the Gentile world His plan of redemption.
Every time Abraham went to the Promised Land he would go up to that
beloved spot where he first erected an altar unto the Lord, and there at Bethel he
worshipped God. It was always with the presentation of sacrifice, with the
shedding of blood. The Lord had revealed to man that no other approach was to
be made except by the shedding of blood. They made their offering by sacrifice,

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and it was usually a whole burnt offering. This typified prayer and consecration.
They worshipped God in the service which they went through in the same
spiritual attitude that we do today when we go into our closets and engage in
prayer or go to the altar. They presented their petitions unto the Lord.
Noah made an offering of thanksgiving for having been preserved through
that period of disaster and peril. We today do not need animal sacrifices,
because the true Sacrifice has already been offered. But for them it was
necessary every time to come to God with shed blood.
The Mosaic Period
We next move to the period of the law, or, as it is often called, the Mosaic
Period. Moses was the outstanding character. This was after the Israelites had
been in bondage down in Egypt. God had revealed to Abraham four hundred
years before what would take place. It was a long time. What do you suppose
was God’s purpose in allowing His people to fall into bondage in Egypt? He
called it the “iron furnace,” in one place. It was a disciplining which they went
through. At the end of that period of disciplining they were delivered out of Egypt
and the Passover was established.
This deliverance became a landmark in Israel’s history. It was the great
event to which they looked back and to which all the prophets pointed. Thus
there was impressed upon the Israelites the fact that God was their Deliverer,
and also that they owed their lives to God because of that deliverance. It was
typical of salvation – justification by faith, deliverance out of the bondage of sin.
After they had gone through this disciplining, they reached the point where
they cried unto the Lord. God heard their groaning, and in response came to their
deliverance. They had already turned, in a measure, to the Lord. Then He
brought them out through the Red Sea into the wilderness. Every step of the
way, from the time God began dealing with them by the hand of Moses, was
miraculous, revealing God’s mighty power.
You will find from that time on that throughout all God’s dealings His
supernatural power was manifested. That is what has characterized the true
religion of Jehovah – it is pre-eminently supernatural. It is true that there are
supernatural manifestations in certain false religion, as was seen before the court
of Pharaoh. But there is enough difference that the discerning heart and mind
can see it. There came a point where the magicians before the court of Pharaoh
could do nothing more.
Then we come to where God brings the Israelites up to Mount Sinai to
give them His Law. Moses was chosen to be the lawgiver and he received the
law at the hand of the Lord.
Here is a great advance over the patriarchal period. They had no written
law. The law was written on their conscience; but when the conscience became
hardened, they had nothing to direct them. It was as wrong to steal in the
patriarchal age as it was in the Mosaic age. The principle was there because it
was written on men’s hearts. Noah knew just as well in his day that it was wrong
to steal as Moses did. But here the principles were elaborated upon and detailed.
God was revealing Himself through His written Law.

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 The Ten Commandments were not all that Moses received from the Lord.
There was also the Book of the Covenant in which all the Law was written. After
God had given the moral and civil law, they were dedicated by the sprinkling of
blood, and the people were sprinkled with blood. The people there said, “All the
words which the LORD hath said will we do” (Exodus 24:3). They thus bound
themselves by a covenant.
The blood was the sealing of the covenant. After that, the Lord gave
Moses the ceremonial law. God told Moses to build a Tabernacle that He might
dwell in their midst. This was a step far in advance of the patriarchal period. God
was going to dwell with His people. He gave express instructions how the
tabernacle was to be built, even to the dimensions, and every piece of furniture
that was to go into it. Next came instructions concerning the Tabernacle service.
He selected the order of priests from the family of Aaron to conduct the service.
Object Lesson
The Tabernacle service was instituted as a symbol by which the Law could
be satisfied so that God would receive the worshippers. They were like children
in a kindergarten coarse; they had to have their object lessons. When the teacher
wants to teach arithmetic he gives a child marbles or some objects by which to
do his computing. In higher grades it has to be done in the abstract, either
mentally or by figures on the board. In the same way, God deals with men, step
by step.
There is one thing certain: if the Law had been written on their hearts
there would have been a very different history concerning their wanderings in the
wilderness. Their rebellions originated in the carnal nature that refused to be
subject to the Law of God. God instituted all the tabernacle service for the
purpose of maintaining the Law, and it prefigured Jesus and His work of
redemption when He would come to earth. The Law was God’s standard of
righteousness revealed. It showed man’s inability to measure up to it in his own
strength, by his own righteousness.
The Israelites were able, through the plan that God had laid down, to
secure definite experiences. They knew what salvation was; they knew what
sanctification was. It was there for them provided they obeyed the instructions
which God gave them. If a man had sinned he brought a trespass offering unto
the Lord. The priest took that offering and put it upon the altar; it was offered unto
the Lord. If that man came in faith believing and God accepted it, the witness was
planted in his heart just as it is in the hearts of believers today. That man had a
knowledge of sins forgiven. But there was no access to the Lord unless he
brought that trespass offering.
The tabernacle service, with its ceremonial order, was for the purpose of
bringing the Israelites to a knowledge of God, and that God might dwell in their
midst. They came into a real experience of salvation and many of them into the
experience of sanctification. Their experience at Sinai was typical of
sanctification, as deliverance out of Egypt was typical of salvation. The giving of
the Law typifies sanctification. The Mosaic period (or the period of the Law)
extended from Moses to Samuel, and the prophetic period from Samuel to
Malachi. The nature of the prophetic period was the teaching of the Law. The

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prophets brought the Word of the Lord unto Israel, expounded the Law, and
reproved them for their disobedience. The prophets such as Elijah, Isaiah, and
Jeremiah gave evidence of being men of high spirituality. Every one of them
stood loyally by the Lord.
In the time of Jeremiah, Israel had so completely failed the Lord that He
was about ready to reject them. Jeremiah gives a promise of another covenant:
God would write the Law on their hearts. He said: “But this shall be the covenant
that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will
put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God,
and they shall be my people” (Jeremiah 31:33). In Ezekiel He said: “And I will
give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony
heart out of their flesh, and will give them an heart of flesh” (Ezekiel 11:19). It is
quite significant: He wrote the Law on stone because their hearts were in a state
that He could not write it on them; but He will give them hearts of flesh and write
the Law there in time to come.
The Dispensation of Grace
That brings us to the Dispensation of Grace. In this Dispensation of Grace
there is an invisible Kingdom; and with the ushering in of the invisible, the
symbolic ordinances, the tabernacle service with its priests and sacrifices passed
away. Paul calls these things the rudiments of the world; that is, they were all
perishable things taken out of the world to symbolize the imperishable.
In the Dispensation of Grace the central figure is the Lord Jesus Christ.
He, in fact, stands out above all, whether in the Old or New Dispensation. The
first thing He does is to give us an interpretation of the Law in the light of the New
Dispensation. That you have in the Sermon on the Mount. He restored what had
been lost through Israel’s backslidings. When Jesus came He restored the
spiritual to the Law. In so doing He gave what was the first and great
commandment:
“And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,
and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy
strength: this is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30).
That put love as the cardinal principal in the New Dispensation, Love is the
fulfillment of the Law. That love is greater than human love; it is clear beyond any
love that this world knows – it is divine love. The word used is the same word
found in John 3:16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten
Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
When they spoke of human love, as the love of a father for his children,
the Greek, as a rule, used another word. This was that divine love which no man
has until he has had a change of heart, until he has been born again.
Christ came to fulfill the Law; and it found its perfect fulfillment in Him.
Down through the ages all generations had failed, even God’s own chosen
people had failed in the keeping of the Law. Man had completely failed God; but
here came the Son of God to earth and walked among men and fulfilled it to the
letter. His life was sinless. Jesus met the requirements perfectly, He failed in
nothing – not in thought, word or deed. He kept the Law perfectly from start to
finish. He had the wisdom, the knowledge, and the judgment which the ordinary

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man does not possess, which enabled Him in all things to observe the Law
perfectly.
He then made it possible by the sacrifice of Himself to have the Law
perfectly fulfilled in every individual who received Him. Thus in every follower of
the Lord Jesus Christ is the Law fulfilled.
When a believer prays through and Jesus Christ comes into his heart,
immediately he is under the Blood; and that man stands before God as though
he had never committed sin. That man, it is true, does not come up to Jesus
Christ in measuring up to the Law; but the righteousness of Jesus Christ is
imputed to him where he fails of the standard. He commits no sin because sin is
a known transgression of the Law. But where he fails through lack of judgment,
through lack of knowledge, through infirmities of the flesh, the righteousness of
Jesus Christ is imputed to him. Thus, through the righteousness of Jesus Christ
he stands accepted of the Lord; and thus is the Law fulfilled.
The Kingdom of Heaven
The work which Jesus was seeking was to set up the Kingdom of Heaven
in the hearts of men – the invisible Kingdom. Jesus spoke much about the
Kingdom; He gave many parables concerning the Kingdom. There are two
phases of the Kingdom: there is the invisible Kingdom in the hearts of men now;
and then there is coming a time when it will be established on earth and become
a visible Kingdom. Jesus said: “Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, Lo there! for,
behold, the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21). In this dispensation it
comes not by outward observation; but there is coming a time when it will be
outward, when every eye shall see Him. In this present time it is an invisible
Kingdom set up in the heart in preparation for the visible Kingdom.
Baptism of the Holy Ghost
The gift of the Holy Ghost marks this period as the dispensation beyond all
others. From the very beginning of Jesus’ ministry it was promised. Upon the Day
of Pentecost it was fulfilled. In the Tabernacle they had the Shekinah glory of
God. But in this period we have the glory of God within the temple of our heart.
Above all else, this is distinctly the Dispensation of the Holy Ghost, the
dispensation in which the Third Person of the Trinity takes up His abode officially
in the heart and dwells there.
The matter of the Holy Ghost has caused confusion to some people
because they say they received the Holy Ghost when they were saved. They did
receive a measure of the Spirit, and received a greater fullness yet when they
were sanctified. But He never came in His fullness until the baptism of the Holy
Ghost was received. When the disciples were sanctified the Holy Ghost came in
His sanctifying power, but they were not baptized with the Holy Ghost until He
filled all the place where they were. Then the Holy Ghost came in in His fullness.
Through the ages those churches that have failed to recognize or to
receive the baptism of the Holy Ghost have failed of the thing which marks this
dispensation. This is the Dispensation of the Holy Ghost. Some of the Christian
writers even went to the extent of saying that any man who did not have the
Baptism of the Holy Ghost was not a Christian in the New Testament sense. It is

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necessary for you and for me to have the baptism of the Holy Ghost if we
measure up to the blessings intended for those of this dispensation.
In this course of Bible study we shall cover Paul’s Epistle to the Hebrews.
This is one of the grandest portions, not only in the New Testament, but of all
God’s Word. It gives us a panoramic view of God’s plan for this world. It gives us
a comprehensive reason for the plan of salvation which God laid out for mankind
before the foundation of the world.
The writer develops his subject with the majestic movement of a grand
symphony. It touches upon the most sublime subjects of the Bible: the eternal
Godhead and His great plan for man unfolded – not only in the New Testament,
but also in the Old.
The Epistle to the Hebrews gives us a comprehensive grasp of the Old
Testament. It reaches the meaning of the Law: not only the moral, but the
ceremonial law, and its place in God’s economy. Some people seem to think that
with the ushering in of the Dispensation of Grace the Old Testament is relegated
to the background and is not of any importance; but the Old and the New
Testaments combine to make a grand whole. Neither stands alone.
Some people have the idea that God, after trying out the Law and finding
that it failed, then gave us the day of grace. But this is not the case. It was all
undertaken in the mind of God from the very beginning. Down through the ages
His plan of salvation has unfolded, line upon line, precept upon precept, until it
reached the day of which “the prophets have inquired” and “the angels desire to
look into.” It was not given to them to know, but it has been given to us – the
Gospel Dispensation.
The Jews – God’s Chosen People
This Epistle is addressed to the Hebrew Christians. There is evidence
found here that they were in danger of falling away, for we find every now and
then throughout this Book exhortations to faithfulness inserted as parentheses.
Great persecutions had arisen against those Hebrews, no doubt chiefly
from their own brethren who were enemies of the Gospel. Thus they had
persecution on one hand, and the enticement to Judaism upon the other hand.
We must take into account the mind and intent of those Jews in order to
understand their position. They were trained in the Law from their earliest
infancy. They had had drilled into them that the Jewish people were the people of
God – and so they were. What they had been taught concerning the Law was
true; but their misconception was that in order for the Gentiles to be included in
God’s plan of salvation the Gentiles must become Jews by adoption. That was
not God’s plan. That was where the scribes and Pharisees made their mistake.
The Jews thought their Old Testament religious policy and ceremonies
would continue, and thus through them would the Gentile world be saved. Many
of the Jews came into contact with the Gospel and were genuinely converted; but
it was hard for them to break away from the old Jewish teaching and ceremonies
which they had been taught. They occupied a big place in their lives. To
renounce completely all that teaching and turn their back upon it was not easy. In
addition to this, they were being fiercely persecuted by their own brethren for the
stand they had taken.

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 “But call to remembrance the former days, in which,
after ye were illuminated, ye endured a great fight of
afflictions;
“Partly, whilst ye were made a gazingstock both by
reproaches and afflictions; and partly, whilst ye became
companions of them that were so used.
“For ye had compassion of me in my bonds, and took
joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that
ye have in heaven a better and an enduring substance”
(Hebrews 10:32-34).
Then he exhorted them: “Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving
against sin.” They had not reached that point yet, but it was no small persecution
they were facing.
Truth and Error
Then came the Judaizers who were saying that no one could be saved
unless he conformed to the Law of Moses: the rite of circumcision, and many
other rites. In Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians one can see where the Gentiles
were overcome by this same false doctrine. And the Jews were of a frame of
mind to be overcome easily by this mistake. Judaizers during the ministry of
Jesus were called Pharisees. In our day they are known as Seventh-Day
Adventists. Their object is the same: to bring man into bondage to the Law, from
which he has been set free in Christ Jesus. Of course we know where that
originates; it is from the devil. He tries to bring men into bondage. The Lord sets
them free. We have had the Judaizers through all the ages who have tried to
return to the Law.
The Old and the New
The book of Hebrews brings out beautifully the contrast between the Old
and the New Dispensations – the Old is the Law, and the New is of grace. The
Old was the “shadow”; the New is the “substance.” The very word “substance” is
used: “Faith is the substance of things hoped for.” It is used a number of times
throughout this Book. We call it “reality” in these days. We say, “I have found
reality in the Gospel.” We are not clinging to the shadows anymore; we have the
very substance itself. The Law, having the “shadow” of good things to come,
pointed to the reality. Therefore, the ceremonial laws were the types or outward
expressions of truth yet to be revealed. So those ceremonies conducted in the
Tabernacle, and in the Temple later on, all had their significance. That is what
the Book of Hebrews brings out: the significance of those “shadows.”
The Adventists speak of a ceremonial law, a moral law, and a civil law.
That is a very specious argument with them because there are those three kinds
of laws in the Old Testament. There was the moral law, the heart of which is
found in the Ten Commandments; and it is expounded through the other Books
of the Old Testament. Then there was the ceremonial law which is set forth in
Leviticus. This includes the sacrifices, the offerings, the feast day observances,
and the other ceremonies through which the Levitical priesthood went. There was
also the civil law, which was to govern their conduct and their acts.

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 All those laws are found in the Old Testament. But the point to be noted is
that the Old Testament writers make no such division. When it speaks of the
Law, it means the whole Law as a unit. The modern-day Judaizers, when they
come to the statements in the New Testament about the Law passing away,
maintain that it means the ceremonial law. We have as much right to say that it
was the civil law which passed away. The Bible does not specify – it simply
states that the Law passed away (Colossians 2:13, 14). Of course, many times
when the writers of the New Testament referred to the Law, they had reference
to the entire Word of God. Jesus and the New Testament writers quoted from
many Books of the Old Testament and they called it “the law.” The Judaizers
confuse many honest seekers – they make a distinction where the Bible makes
no such distinction.
In the study of the Bible one thing should always be borne in mind: any
interpretation we make must be backed by Scripture itself. Scripture interprets
Scripture; and whenever you depart from that rule you are getting on dangerous
ground. That is where many false religionists have gone astray: instead of using
Scripture for the interpretation of Scripture they are putting their own
interpretation upon it. The Bible says no Scripture is of private interpretation.
A Better Plan
There is a key word running through the Epistle to the Hebrews that will
help us to understand it, and that word is “better.” It is used 13 times throughout
the Epistle. In the use of this word the relation of the two dispensations is
revealed – the Old and the New.
We have, it is stated, a “better” revelation in the New Dispensation than in
the Old. The Lord revealed Himself in the Old, but we have a better revelation of
Him in the New (Hebrews 1:1-4); we have a “better” hope in the New
Dispensation than we had in the Old (Hebrews 7:19); we have a “better”
priesthood than in the Old (Hebrews 7:20-28).
We have a “better” covenant; and that we want to have well fixed in our
minds, because this is the point which some war on – the question of the Old and
New Covenant. That is brought out in Hebrews 8:6. We have “better”
possessions (Hebrews 10:34); a “better” country (Hebrews 11:16); “better”
sacrifices (Hebrews 9:23). We have “better” promises. Inheriting the Promised
Land was the blessing that was held out as a hope to the Israelites from the time
that God made His promise to Abraham. God said that He would bring them into
that land; and in doing it He would bring them out of the bondage they were in in
Egypt. But we have a “better” country than they to look to, and we have a “better”
resurrection, as brought out in Hebrews 11:35.
Thus, because of the ushering in of a better dispensation, the bold
statement is made that the Old Law passed away – the moral law, the civil law,
and the ceremonial law. That is a shock to some people; they cannot see how
moral law can ever pass away. But let us bear in mind that it was the Law in its
Old Testament framing which passed away, because it was superseded by a
better law and a better dispensation.
For instance, take the law against stealing: “Thou shalt not steal.” That
moral principal was in force before the Law was ever legislated, before the Ten

10
Commandments were given. People were punished for stealing before the
Commandments were given. So that law has always existed as a principle.
We, in the State of Oregon, have a law enacted against stealing. Suppose
for some reason or other the Oregon Legislature would propose to repeal that
law against stealing and to enact a new law, more comprehensive and that would
care for cases of theft in a better way. Would their repealing the law against
stealing dispense with the principle of the thing? No! Then does the passing
away of the Old Testament Law change any of the principles by which it is
framed? You will find enunciated in the New Testament every one of them,
except the one concerning the Sabbath. There is no reason why it should shock
anyone. The precepts have enunciated in a different form, and some of them in a
higher form than is found in the Old Testament.
Take the matter of murder: Jesus said, “Ye have heard that it was said by
them of old time, Thou shalt not kill . . . but I say unto you, That whosoever is
angry with his brother . . . shall be in danger of the judgment” (Matthew 5:21,22).
He put the Law upon a higher plane in which the heart is taken into account as
well as the outward act. But every moral principle it contained is found reaffirmed
in the New Testament.
Christ Revealed
The whole Mosaic economy passed away with the ushering in of the New
Dispensation. What then was God’s object in establishing the Law of the Old
Testament with its sacrifices and its ceremonies and civil order? For one thing:
the Law was to bring men to a knowledge of sin in order to bring them to Christ.
That you will find set forth distinctly in Romans 3:20, Romans 7:13, and Galations
3:24.

The Exaltation of Jesus Christ

----Lesson Two----
“God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto
the fathers by the prophets,
“Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath
appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds;
“Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his
person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by
himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on
high” (Hebrews 1:1-3).
What a sublime subject with which to open this Epistle – the revelation of
God to man: He is the express image of His Person, the brightness of His Glory.
God, in the New Testament, revealed Himself through the Lord Jesus Christ.
That is the thought with which this Book opens. We have here, therefore, the
better revelation. The Law could never completely reveal God; but Jesus Christ
can. He is the perfect reflection of God.
Frequently in Jesus’ ministry upon earth His majesty would shine forth
with such radiance that it awed those who stood before Him. When the soldiers

11
were sent to take Jesus, they fell backward as they were struck with awe by the
very majesty of His presence. Moses, when he came down from Mount Sinai,
had to put a veil upon his face because of the glory of God that was reflected in
his countenance after the forty days of communing with God. But that was just a
passing radiance. With Christ it was a glimpse of His eternal, never-fading glory.
The prophets expounded the Law in the Old Testament in sundry times
and divers manners; but Jesus Christ stands out above every one of them. It
speaks in II Thessalonians of how the antichrist shall be slain by the brightness
of His coming. He will come in great glory at that time with all the holy angels in
attendance.
When Jesus took Peter, James, and John up into the Mount of
Transfiguration, they had a view of that glory. He had previously said that some
of them should not see death until they should see the Son of man coming in His
glory. Eight days later they went up to the mount and He was transfigured before
them. That was the glory of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and
truth. Here is a description of Jesus which has all the attributes ascribed to God
Himself.
Jesus was the Creator, and the worlds were made by His power. Not only
that, He sustains them. They were created not only by Him, but they were
created for Him, as is brought out here. We get a glimpse of Jesus Christ in the
opening of this Epistle which gives us a little hint of who that Man of Galilee was
who once walked on this earth, who “came unto his own, and his own received
him not.” You can see by that that the Creator of Heaven and earth came down
to this earth in the person of Jesus Christ, could walk among men and yet they
could be so utterly blinded and so stupid as not to recognize Him as God
incarnate, God manifest in the flesh. Yet that was the case. He was above all the
prophets.
God at sundry times, line upon line and precept upon precept, revealed
the Law as it was expounded through His prophets. We are now living in the
days when it is all revealed through Jesus Christ. Every one of those prophets
pointed to Jesus Christ, from Moses down. In Deuteronomy 18:15 it is recorded
that Moses said, “The LORD thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet from the
midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him ye shall hearken.” That
pointed down to Jesus Christ. And from that time on every one of the prophets
began to point down to the coming of the Messiah, that Holy One for whom the
Jews were looking.
The Preeminence of Christ
Next, Paul takes up the fact that Jesus was made much better than the
angels. All the angels are created beings; even the archangels who stand before
the throne of God are created beings. Jesus was not. He was with the Father
from the very beginning, from all eternity. John brings that out also. He said, “In
the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was
God” (John 1:1).
“Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath
by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.

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 “For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou
art my Son, this day have I begotten thee?”
This was expressly spoken of Jesus.
“. . . And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be
to me a Son?
“And again, when he bringeth in the firstbegotten into
the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him”
(Hebrews 1:4-6).
When Jesus was here upon earth He always accepted true worship that
was accorded Him. For instance, the man who had been healed at the Pool of
Bethesda recognized Jesus and came and worshipped Him.
We can find the whole Gospel laid out in the Book of Hebrews, from
justification through to all the experiences and also the coming of the Lord.
“And of the angels he saith, Who maketh his angels
spirits, and his ministers a flame of fire.
“But unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for
ever and ever” (Hebrews 1:7, 8).
This gives us a little insight into some of those Old Testament sayings.
They are especially here attributed to Jesus Christ, quoting from Psalm 45:6, 7:
“Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever: the sceptre of
thy kingdom is a right sceptre.
“Thou lovest righteousness, and hatest wickedness:
therefore God, thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of
gladness above thy fellows.” [Above all that were in Heaven or
in the earth.]
“And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the
foundation of the earth; and the heavens are the works of thine
hands: [These are all attributed to Jesus.]
“They shall perish; but thou remainest; and they all shall
wax old as doth a garment;
“And as a vesture shalt thou fold them up, and they
shall be changed: but thou art the same, and thy years shall
not fail” (Hebrews 1:10-12).
Jesus Exalted
“But to which of the angels said he at any time, Sit on
my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool?”
(Hebrews 1:13).
That refers to the time when Jesus shall return and take up the reins of
government, and all His enemies shall be put down.
“Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to
minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation?” (Hebrews
1:14).
It is set forth here that Jesus Christ is exalted above all creation. We can
begin to see how the dispensation in which we live outshines the Old
Dispensation as the rising sun outshines the stars of night. As the sun rises the

13
stars disappear; and as the glory of the New Dispensation burst upon the earth
the glory of the Old began to fade away.
Paul brings that out in II Corinthians 3:7:
“But if the ministration of death, written and engraven in
stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not
stedfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his
countenance; which glory was to be done away: [It was only
for the time being.]
“How shall not the ministration of the spirit be rather
glorious?
“For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, much
more doth the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory.
“For even that which was made glorious had no glory in
this respect, by reason of the glory that excelleth.
“For if that which is done away was glorious, much
more that which remaineth is glorious” (II Corinthians 3:7-11).
The ministration written in stone was the Ten Commandments. So it was
more than just the ceremonial law that was done away.
The Old Testament speaks of the covenant made at Horeb. What was that
covenant? Did it not embrace the Ten Commandments? If that covenant waxed
old and passed away, then all that was embraced in it has gone. Nothing
remains, including the Jewish Sabbath, the fourth commandment.
If we get a clear view of God’s great plan, the unfolding of it, it helps us in
the interpretation of other Scriptures and the understanding of the doctrines and
the general teachings. We get our orientation from the plan that God has laid
down, and all our interpretation of other Scriptures comes from that standpoint.
Now let us go back to the beginning of the chapter, and take up the study
of the Holy Trinity.
The Sonship of Jesus
“God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake
in time past unto the fathers by the prophets,
“Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son,
whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he
made the worlds;
“Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express
image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of
his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down
on the right hand of the Majesty on high” (Hebrews 1:1-3).
This brings up immediately the Sonship of Jesus Christ, and we will now
study the Scriptures from that viewpoint. Here we have the Person of the Father
mentioned on the one hand, and the Person of the Son on the other. In the 5th
verse we read:
“For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou
art my Son, this day have I begotten thee?”
Down through the ages of Christianity the doctrine of the Trinity has been
assailed. “Trinity” is a Latin word. It came from the Latin which means “threefold”

14
or “three-in-one.” It was applied to the Godhead because of the fact that the
Scriptures reveal three Persons in the Godhead.
A person is one who is a rational and a moral being. Webster’s definition
of a person is: one who has power to think, to speak, and to act. God has all
those powers. If the Son speaks to the Father and the Father speaks to the Son
we may classify them both as Persons. In addition, the Bible has already called
God a Person – the Father. Here we have two Persons of the Godhead fixed.
In the second Psalm, from which the writer of Hebrews quotes, is another
reference to the Sonship of Jesus. In this Psalm we find very plainly two Persons
revealed. We shall begin with the 4th verse:
“He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord
shall have them in derision.
“Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex
them in his sore displeasure.
“Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion.
“I will declare the decree: the LORD hath said unto me,
Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee” (Psalm 2: 4-7).
The Personality of the Father and of the Son
In these latter days there is a philosophy that is dispensing with the
personality, not only of the Son and the Holy Ghost, but of God Himself. Many of
the philosophies and much of modernism is founded upon it. It is believed that
God is an all-pervading power, something like electricity. Electricity is power, but
there is no personality to it. Electricity has no power to think or act in a rational
way.
Then there is the false teaching known as the “Jesus Only” doctrine. They
say that Jesus is the only one in the Godhead. They say that Jesus is the Father,
and He is the Son, and He is all and in all. They deny any personality to the
Spirit. In denying the Trinity they set aside not only the Father and the Holy
Ghost, but in so doing they set aside Jesus Christ also, they cannot deny one
Person of the Trinity without denying them all.
We can go back to one Old Testament prophecy after another that is
vouched for as being the Word of God; and in its application in the New
Testament it brings out definitely the Second Person of the Trinity, the Lord
Jesus Christ, separate from the Father; and there are other passages that are
directly attributed to the Holy Spirit and which give Him personality also. We have
abundant Scriptural grounds for the stand that we have taken concerning the
Trinity. It is being fiercely denied in these days. So it is necessary for us to know
our Scriptural grounds as to these great fundamental teachings of the Bible, and
know positively where we stand and be able to give an answer. Now passing to
Hebrews 1:5, we have a reference to the second Psalm:
“. . . I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a
Son.”
We have another quotation, which is thought to be taken from Psalm 89:
“And again, when he bringeth in the firstbegotten into
the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him”
(Hebrews 1:6).

15
 The reading is a little bit different in the Psalm:
“He shall cry unto me, Thou art my father, my God, and
the rock of my salvation.
“Also I will make him my firstborn, higher than the kings
of the earth” (Psalm 89:26, 27).
That is clearly Messianic and has the approval of the New Testament
upon it.
“And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the
foundation of the earth; and the heavens are the works of thine
hands:
“They shall perish; but thou remainest; and they all shall
wax old as doth a garment;
“And as a vesture shalt thou fold them up, and they
shall be changed: but thou art the same, and thy years shall
not fail” (Hebrews 1:10-12).
All this is attributed to Jesus Christ. Here He is called “God” – co-equal
with the Father in every respect. That quotation is taken from Psalm 102. We
have the authority of the New Testament for attributing it to Jesus Christ. See the
25th verse.
“Of old hast thou laid the foundation of the earth: . . .”
Jesus is taking part in the creation, as is verified in the Old Testament as
well as in the New.
“. . . and the heavens are the work of thy hands.
“They shall perish, but thou shalt endure: yea, all of
them shall wax old like a garment; as a vesture shalt thou
change them, and they shall be changed:
“But thou art the same, and thy years shall have no
end.”
All this is in the Old Testament. His eternity, and also the fact that He was
the Creator are attributed to Jesus Christ in that Psalm. Psalm 110 is also
mentioned in Hebrews 1:13.
“The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand,
until I make thine enemies thy footstool” (Psalm 110:1).
Here we find the conversation between the two, the Father and the Son,
“The LORD said unto my Lord, . . .” We find the name of Jehovah attributed to
Jesus as well as to the Father: “The LORD said unto my Lord.” Everywhere that
you find the “LORD” spelled in capitals in your Bible, that means “Jehovah.” We
will take up a little later the two names that are attached to God. Not only is that
quoted in our Epistle to the Hebrews, but Jesus Himself took up this Psalm in
Matthew 22:
“While the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus
asked them,
“Saying, What think ye of Christ? Whose son is he?
They say unto him, The Son of David.
“He saith unto them, How then doth David in spirit call
him Lord, saying,

16
 “The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right
hand, till I make thine enemies thy footstool?
“If David then call him Lord, how is he his son?”
(Matthew 22:41-45).
Jesus, in speaking to these unbelieving Pharisees, was going back into
the Scriptures that they themselves professed to believe, to show that the
Messiah was the Son of the living God in addition to being the Son of David:
“And no man was able to answer him a word, neither
durst any man from that day forth ask him any more
questions” (Matthew 22:46).
You see how perfectly throughout the Old Testament the Sonship of Jesus
Christ is established as the second Person of the Trinity. The Son speaks to the
Father and the Father to the Son; not in one place only, but in a number of
places. All of it has the stamp of approval of the New Testament. While we are
on the subject of the Trinity, let us take up a few more points. Turn to Genesis
1:1:
“In the beginning God created the heaven and the
earth.”
The Hebrew word here translated God is “Elohim,” and it is in the plural
form. It is the form almost invariably used throughout the Bible. It means “God.”
The “him” gives the word the plural form. That is the way the Hebrew plurals
were formed. We have in the very name itself the plurality in the Godhead
expressed. But, strange to say, with the plural subject “Elohim,” the singular verb
for “created” is used.
According to the rules of grammar, that would not be correct; but it is
perfectly theological because although “Elohim” expresses the plurality of agents,
the word “create” expresses the unity of action, that they all act as one. Here we
have the plurality in one. In addition to this, look at the 26th verse. That is when
God came to the creation of man.
“And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our
likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea,
and over the fowl of the air, . . .” (“Let us” – plural form).
Again in Genesis 3:22:
“And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as
one of us, . . .” (Plural form again).
Then Genesis 11:7. This is when they had built the Tower of Babel.
“Go to, let us go down, and there confound their
language, . . .” (Plural form again).
Now turn to Isaiah 6:8:
“Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I
send, and who will go for us?” (Used again in the plural).
Isaiah’s Vision of Jesus Christ
Isaiah’s vision, found in Isaiah 6, is a remarkable passage of Scripture.
We believe it was at this time Isaiah was sanctified.

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 “In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord
sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the
temple.” (He saw a vision of God’s holiness.)
This is the only mention of “seraphims” in the Bible and they seem to have
been heavenly creatures.
“Above it stood the seraphims: each one had six wings;
with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his
feet, and with twain he did fly.
“And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy,
is the LORD of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory.
“And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him
that cried, and the house was filled with smoke.
“Then said I, Woe is me! For I am undone; because I am
a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of
unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the LORD of
hosts.
“Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live
coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off
the altar:
“And he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath
touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin
purged.
“Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, . . .”
Isaiah felt that the hindrance which had hindered him in his service was
taken away, and he was ready for service.
“Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I
send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me.
“And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed,
but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not.
“Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears
heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and
hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and
convert, and be healed” (Isaiah 6:1-10)
Isaiah 6:9 is a passage of Scripture that is quoted frequently in the New
Testament. Jesus quoted it when He gave us the parable of the sower.
Turn to John 12:37. The writer is speaking about Jesus:
But though he had done so many miracles before them,
yet they believed not on him:
“That the saying of Esaias the prophet might be fulfilled,
which he spake, Lord, who hath believed our report? and to
whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed?
“Therefore they could not believe, because that Esaias
said again,
“He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart;
that they should not see with their eyes, nor understand with
their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them.

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 “These things said Esaias, when he saw his glory, and
spake of him” (John 12:37-41).
This refers to the Son, the second Person of the Trinity. Isaiah spoke this
when he saw the glory of Christ, and he spoke it under the inspiration of the Holy
Ghost. He saw God exalted and His train filled the Temple. There we have the
three in the Trinity. So it was not a mere accident that those seraphims sang,
“Holy, holy, holy.” There are no words spoken at random in the Word of God.
There was one “holy” for each Person.
Turn now to Acts 28:24. This was when Paul made his journey to Rome
and was made a prisoner under Nero. He was, however, allowed to receive his
acquaintances and friends, among whom were many Jews. They were coming to
hear him concerning this “way,” as they called it, that Paul had taken. Beginning
with the 24th verse:
“And some believed the things which were spoken, and
some believed not.
“And when they agreed not among themselves, they
departed, after that Paul had spoken one word, Well spake the
Holy Ghost by Esaias the prophet unto our fathers,
“Saying, Go unto this people, and say, Hearing ye shall
hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and
not perceive:
“For the heart of this people is waxed gross, and their
ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes have they closed; lest
they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and
understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I
should heal them.
“Be it known therefore unto you, that the salvation of
God is sent unto the Gentiles, and that they will hear it”
(Acts 28:24-28).
Paul quoted that almost word for word from Isaiah 6. The point here is that
Paul was preaching salvation through Jesus Christ the Son of God, and he refers
to this passage in Acts, saying that the Holy Ghost spoke. The Holy Ghost spoke
to Isaiah, giving him the message from the Lord. There we have the Third Person
of the Trinity mentioned.
Positive Proof of the Trinity
After Jesus came out of the wilderness He went up to Nazareth His home
town. On the Sabbath day He went into the synagogue and opened the Scripture
and quoted from Isaiah the 61st chapter, 1st verse:
“The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the
LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek;
. . .”
Jesus had gone into the wilderness to His temptation immediately after
His baptism. The anointing that was prophesied by Isaiah, “The LORD hath
anointed me,” was fulfilled in His baptism just prior to His going into the
wilderness. That anointing was for service. We might turn to it briefly in Matthew
3:

19
 “Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John,
to be baptized of him.
“But John forbad him, saying, I have need to be
baptized of thee, and comest thou to me?
“And Jesus answering said unto him, Suffer it to be so
now: for thus it becometh us to fulfill all righteousness. Then
he suffered him.
“And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway
out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him,
and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and
lighting upon him:
“And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved
Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:13-17).
There we have Jesus in bodily form present, the Holy Ghost in the form of
a dove, and the voice of the Father from Heaven. The Father has never been
revealed to mortal eyes, but Jesus has; and so has the Holy Ghost, upon this
particular occasion in the form of a dove. There you have the Trinity – all Three
Persons.
This great event of the anointing of the Lord Jesus Christ was the Spirit’s
coming upon Him. He began His ministry at the time of His baptism. It was
declared authoritatively by God’s voice from Heaven. The Scriptures give us
abundant grounds for our doctrine of Three Persons in the Godhead.
We also have the baptismal formula:
“Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them
in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Ghost” (Matthew 28:19)
There are a few other passages of Scripture that we will take up
concerning the part of the Trinity in the creation. Turn to Isaiah 64:8:
“But now, O LORD, thou art our father; . . . we all are the
work of thy hand.”
The work of creation is attributed definitely to the Father as well as to the
Lord Jesus Christ in I Corinthians 8:6.
“But to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are
all things, and we in him: and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom
are all things, and we by him.”
Also in Colossians 1:16:
“For by him [that is, by Jesus Christ] were all things
created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and
invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or
principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and
for him.”
Ponder over that for a little while. There is no more sweeping statement
made concerning Jesus Christ as Creator than we have in that verse.
Another text bringing out that point is John 1:3:
“All things were made by him; and without him was not
any thing made that was made.”

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The Spirit
The following passages of Scripture refer to the Third Person of the
Trinity. Genesis 1:2:
“And the earth was without form, and void; and
darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God
moved upon the face of the waters” (Genesis 1:2).
“By his spirit he hath garnished the heavens; his hand
hath formed the crooked serpent” (Job 26:13).
When it says “garnished the heavens” it means He hung the stars on
nothing. They are all swinging in their orbits by His sustaining power. This is
referring to the Spirit.
“The Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the
Almighty hath given me life” (Job 33:4).
We have definitely in these Scriptures the creative work attributed to the
Father, by name to the Son, by name to the Holy Spirit. It was brought out
definitely in the Psalms the personality of the Father and of the Son, because a
person is a rational, moral being with capacity to think, to speak, and act. That is
in substance the definition in the dictionary. Therefore, if there are those in the
Godhead who give evidence of those powers, we have a right to attribute
personality to them. When the Son speaks to the Father and the Father to the
Son, as occurs in these Psalms, that definitely establishes their personality.
In addition to that, we have also found the presence of the third Member.
We will not call the Holy Ghost a person for the present until we establish it. His
presence was there at the baptism of Jesus Christ. He was named in the
baptismal formula. He has taken part in the creative work; but it yet remains to
establish personality for the Third Person. That is where a good many halt. They
are willing to attribute personality to the other two, but many halt here. We will
take that up now. In the first place we have the personal pronoun “I,” then “Him”
(or “He”), and “Thou” all applied to the Holy Spirit.
“And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you
another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;
[Notice that pronoun “he” applied to the Comforter.]
“Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot
receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye
know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.
“I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.
“Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but
ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also.
“At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye
in me, and I in you” (John 14:16-20).
We cannot call that a figure of speech where it is used so consistently.
The writer has definitely applied to this member of the Trinity the personal
pronoun. Let us drop to the 26th verse:
“But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the
Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and

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 bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said
unto you.”
Here the Comforter is identified as the Holy Ghost. There are many more
places where these same pronouns are applied to Him.
The Holy Ghost is also capable of being grieved. Paul gives us the
injunction “Grieve not the holy Spirit of God” (Ephesians 4:30). A substance or an
emanation, as some define the Holy Ghost, cannot be grieved; but the Holy
Ghost can, and that endows Him with further personality.
He had power to command, and power to dispatch, or send the disciples.
In Acts 16:7 we read of Paul and the disciples on a missionary trip:
“After they were come to Mysia, they assayed to go into
Bithynia: but the Spirit suffered them not.”
That is, He commanded them not to go.
“So they, being sent forth by the Holy Ghost, departed
unto Seleucia; and from thence they sailed to Cyprus”
(Acts 13:4).
You can see that the Holy Ghost was directing their course.
It is also indicated in Scripture that He is an intelligent being. Turn to
I Corinthians 2:9, 10:
“But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which
God hath prepared for them that love him.
“But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for
the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.”
That attributes personality. A substance or radiance does not search, in
the sense that is here stated.
“For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the
spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God
knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God” (I Corinthians 2:11).
We see there that knowledge is attributed to the Spirit.
And finally in Acts 13:2:
“As they ministered to the Lord, and fasted, the Holy
Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work
whereunto I have called them.”
There the Holy Ghost is speaking, and we have the personal pronoun “I.”
Suppose you were on neutral ground concerning the Bible. You did not know
very much about it, and you knew nothing about the Trinity. After going over
these Scriptures that we have read, what would be your conclusion? Would it not
be that this one spoken of is a person? There are three Persons – personality is
attributed to each of them.
Any fair-minded person who could read those Scriptures and had any
knowledge at all of English knows that these three are spoken of as Persons.
This, therefore, is our ground for saying that there are three Persons in the
Godhead, irrespective of what may be the philosophical differences that so many
seem to have concerning this doctrine. We are not concerned with philosophies;

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what we are concerned with is what the Word of God teaches us. We have
definitely settled here that it teaches us the personality of the Godhead.
In the same way the deity of the Holy Ghost may be established. We
found that the Son is God, and the Father is God. The name of God is applied to
the Holy Ghost (Acts 5:3,4). Divine works are attributed to Him. If any member of
the Godhead does works that are of divine nature, we have a right to attribute
divinity to Him. He also has part in the re-creation of man, as we read in the well-
known verse, John 3:5; “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he
cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”
He has part in the resurrection, as we read in I Peter 3:18, and
Romans 8:11:
“For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for
the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in
the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit.”
“But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the
dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall
also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in
you.”
He is also given divine worship, as we saw from our study in the 6th
chapter of Isaiah where the seraphims said, “Holy, holy, holy.” We found that all
three Persons of the Trinity were mentioned in that chapter. It is referred to in
Acts and also in the Gospels.
While we are definitely taught in Scripture the three Persons in the
Godhead, we are just as definitely taught the unity of the Godhead – that is, that
God is one. Here is where the stumbling block has come in. There is a mystery in
the Trinity that we cannot solve. There are plenty of other mysteries for that
matter. We are not trying to solve them. We are only trying to take what the Bible
teaches. It definitely teaches three Persons, but it just as definitely teaches that
there is one God; therefore there must be a difference in the unity from what
there is in personality. Let us turn to Hebrews 1:3:
“Who [Jesus] being the brightness of his glory, and the
express image of his person, . . .”
Who is the Person here referred to? The Father. So Jesus is the express
image of the Father. Jesus said to Philip, “He that hath seen me hath seen the
Father.” But He did not say that He was the Father; He said, “He that hath seen
me hath seen the Father” – not that He is the Father, but the express image of
Him. A difference is brought out. In John 1:1 it says, “In the beginning was the
Word, and the Word was with God, . . .” That is, the Son was with the Father.
Then immediately follows,”. . . and the Word was God.” So that in one sense He
was with God and in another sense He was God. In personality He was with
God, but in divine nature He was God. Therefore in essence or divine nature God
is one, but in personality the Godhead is three. That is just about as far as we
can go with it. There is no use to try to philosophize and reason the thing out.
That is where so many heresies have been brought into the world. We simply
take the plain statement of what the Word says. It ought not be difficult to accept.

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 All men have a common nature. Yet do not their personalities one from
another separate them? Then why should we stumble over the matter of Three
Persons in the Godhead? Taking this view of it, we accept the plain teaching of
the Bible all the way through.

The Old and New Dispensations

----Lesson Three----
The Period Before the Flood
We started in the beginning of these teachings to state that the Book of
Hebrews brought out the differences between the Old Dispensation and the New.
The following is a little sketch of the subdivisions in the different dispensations.
We will take up the Old Dispensation. This is ordinarily called, in the New
Testament, the Law and the Prophets. In the very beginning is the period that is
known as the antediluvian period, the time prior to the Flood. It extended from
Adam to Noah.
In Genesis 2:16, 17, we read that God laid down the provision for Adam
that he could eat of all the trees of the Garden except the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil. He forbade him to eat of that tree. That was virtually a covenant
that He made with Adam. We shall find covenants in every one of these periods
of the Old Testament dispensations – covenants made with men.

Patriarchal Period
The patriarchal period followed the antediluvian period, extending form
Noah to Moses. Here we have a covenant made with Noah when he came out of
the ark after the flood:
“And Noah builded an altar unto the LORD; [This was
right after he landed on Mt. Ararat.] and took of every clean
beast, and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on
the altar” (Genesis 8:20).
Here was blood shed. In the covenant with Adam there was no blood
shed. Why? There was no sin at that time. But here sin has entered in. You will
find from now on that at any time a covenant was made with God concerning
man’s sins, it was with shedding of blood – a recognition that man in his sinful
state could not enter into a covenant with God unless there was a provision by
blood, the one remedy for sin.
“And the LORD smelled a sweet savour; and the LORD
said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for
man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his
youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as
I have done.
“While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and
cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall
not cease” (Genesis 8:21, 22).

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 “And God spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him,
saying,
“And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and
with your seed after you;
“And with every living creature that is with you, of the
fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you;
from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth.
“And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall
all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither
shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.
“And God said, This is the token of the covenant which I
make [He not only made him a covenant but He gave him a
token.] between me and you and every living creature that is
with you, for perpetual generations:
“I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token
of a covenant between me and the earth.
“And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the
earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud:
“And I will remember my covenant, which is between me
and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters
shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh.
“And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon
it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God
and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.
“And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the
covenant, which I have established between me and all flesh
that is upon the earth” (Genesis 9:8-17).
What is the substance of this covenant? It is a covenant for the
preservation of life from then on, that it would not again be destroyed from off the
face of the earth by water, as it had been. That was the covenant with Noah. This
shows how God’s plan gradually unfolded.
In the 10th chapter of Genesis we find enumerated the descendants of
Noah, their names and their dwelling places upon the face of the earth. Here are
all the nationalities – the original nations catalogued in the Word of God. It shows
that God was not through with the Gentile nations. He had further dealings with
them.
The Abrahamic Covenant
Now we shall take up the covenant with Abraham. After God listed those
nations, He began His selective work through calling Abraham from whom was to
descend His peculiar people. This was a further step in the development of His
plan of redemption. The patriarchs were the heads of great tribes or families,
without the establishment of nationalities.

“After these things the word of the LORD came unto

Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield,
and thy exceeding great reward.

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 “And Abram said, Lord GOD, what wilt thou give me,
seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this
Eliezer of Damascus?
“And Abram said, Behold, to me thou hast given no
seed: and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir.
“And, behold, the word of the LORD came unto him,
saying, This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come
forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir.
“And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now
toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number
them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be.
“And he believed in the LORD; and he counted it to him
for righteousness.
“And he said unto him, I am the LORD that brought thee
out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it.
“And he said, Lord GOD, whereby shall I know that I
shall inherit it? [He wanted a token of assurance from the
Lord.]
“And he said unto him, Take me an heifer of three years
old, and a she goat of three years old, and a ram of three years
old, and a turtledove, and a young pigeon.
“And he took unto him all these, and divided them in the
midst, and laid each piece one against another: . . .”
(Genesis 15:1-10).
The pieces were facing one another. This was the manner in which men
made covenants one with the other in those days. The sacrificial beast was slain
and the parts laid out, and then the two parties of the covenant passed between
them. That indicated that the covenant they made was sealed. Here you see that
very thing done in reference to God and Abraham. Is it not marvelous that God
comes, as it were, upon the very plane of a human being to reason with man?
Thus He enters into a covenant with Abraham on the same terms that two men
enter into a covenant.
“And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell
upon Abram; and, lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon
him.
“And he said unto Abram, Know of a surety that thy
seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, . . .”
(Genesis 15:12,13).
That was more than 400 years before it occurred, or before they were
brought out of the land of Egypt.
“. . . and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them
four hundred years;
“And also that nation, whom they shall serve, will I
judge: and afterward shall they come out with great substance.
“And thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt be
buried in a good old age.

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 “But in the fourth generation they shall come hither
again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full.
“And it came to pass, that, when the sun went down,
and it was dark, behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp
that passed between those pieces. [The presence of God
confirmed the covenant.]
“In the same day the LORD made a covenant with
Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the
river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates”
(Genesis 15:13-18).
That was in Mesopotamia. And here the covenant was sealed with
Abraham for the promised land. It was 430 years before the terms of that
covenant were fulfilled. In the time of Solomon the domain of Israel extended
exactly from those bounds – from the river Egypt on the west to the Euphrates on
the east. God was here making provision for His Chosen People whom He was
to bring out of bondage and bring into the land of Canaan.
Period of the Law
The period of the Law, extending from Moses to Samuel, followed the
period of the patriarchs. Then we have the giving of the Law upon Mt. Sinai, the
heart of which was the Ten Commandments, found in Exodus 20:1-17. Let us
now turn to Exodus 24:
“And he said unto Moses, Come up unto the LORD,
thou, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders
of Israel; and worship ye afar off.
“And Moses alone shall come near the LORD: but they
shall not come nigh; neither shall the people go up with him.
“And Moses came and told the people all the words of
the LORD, and all the judgments: and all the people answered
with one voice, and said, All the words which the LORD hath
said will we do.
“And Moses wrote all the words of the LORD, and rose
up early in the morning, and builded an altar under the hill, and
twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel.
“And he sent young men of the children of Israel, which
offered burnt offerings, and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen
unto the LORD.
“And Moses took half of the blood, and put it in basons;
and half of the blood he sprinkled on the altar.
“And he took the book of the covenant, and read in the
audience of the people: and they said, All that the LORD hath
said will we do, and be obedient.
“And Moses took the blood, and sprinkled it on the
people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant, which the
LORD hath made with you concerning all these words”
(Exodus 24:1-8).

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 There the covenant with the children of Israel is sealed, including all the
laws and statutes that were to govern them when they went into the land of
Israel. Can you see the development from the very beginning on down, with one
patriarch after another, the enlarging and unfolding of His covenant with man?
That brings us to the prophetic period, the period of the prophets. It started with
Samuel. (Of coarse Moses is called a prophet, and he was; but his chief office
was that of lawgiver.)
The Prophets
In the time of Samuel the Children of Israel asked for a king, and a king
was established. But at the same time God established the line of prophets of
whom Samuel was the first. God did not speak to the kings directly; He dealt with
them through His prophets. From the time of Samuel on down to Malachi there is
an unbroken line of prophets. There were prophets before the captivity, the
prophets during the captivity, and the prophets who followed the captivity. Each
of these periods had its own particular line of prophecy. That brings us to the
New Dispensation.
The New Dispensation – The Invisible Kingdom
We now come to the New Dispensation. In Deuteronomy 18:15 we read:
“The LORD thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet
from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him
ye shall hearken.”
Those were Moses’ words spoken to Israel. We often say that the Law
and the prophets pointed to Jesus. Here is one case where the lawgiver is
pointing directly to Jesus. John the Baptist was the last representative of the Old
Dispensation. He stood upon the borderline between the two – the last
representative of the Law and the prophets. That day when he stood upon the
banks of the Jordan and pointed to that lone Figure coming down to him, he
cried, “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John
1:29). He sounded the voice of all the prophets. He pointed to the One to whom
they all had pointed.
Moses said here that the Lord would raise up a Prophet like unto him. It is
remarkable how Jesus stood out in the New Dispensation just as Moses stood
out in the Old. It is even observable that the four hundred and thirty years in
which God was silent during the period of bondage down in Egypt is repeated in
Jesus’ case. It may be a coincidence, but nevertheless it exists. It was four
hundred from Malachi to the birth of Christ and then thirty years from that until
Jesus began His ministry. He opened it with the Sermon on the Mount. That
Sermon on the Mount was the declaration of the laws of the Kingdom. It was an
interpretation of the Old Law in the light of the Dispensation of Grace. There we
have Moses, the one who led Israel out of Egyptian bondage; then Jesus Christ,
the One who led Israel out of the bondage of the Law into the glorious light and
liberty of the Gospel.
The Contrast Between Old and New
The Sermon on the Mount opens with the nine Beatitudes. The Beatitudes
are positive; the Ten Commandments are negative – “Thou shalt not.” Thus we

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find the whole spirit of the New Dispensation is a positive spirit instead of a
negative spirit – a blessing pronounced upon those who obey.
And again the Law pointed to the outward conduct, while the Sermon on
the Mount is concerned with the inward condition of the heart. Jesus interpreted
many of the Old Testament laws, not solely the outward conduct, but also the
condition of the heart. Throughout the whole Dispensation of Grace the emphasis
is placed upon the heart more than upon the outward conduct.
This New Dispensation is what might be termed the period of the invisible
kingdom, or the Church period. You will notice from several parables that Jesus
gives concerning the kingdom, that He speaks of the kingdom in two different
lights – the visible kingdom and the invisible kingdom. We are living in the period
of the invisible kingdom when it is established in the heart. This period was to
cover the evangelistic age in which the Gospel should be carried unto all nations.
The Consummation
Jesus, in the 24th chapter of Matthew, said, “And this gospel of the
kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then
shall the end come” (Matthew 24:14). It is to be ended by Christ’s return for His
saints. Following that, comes the period of the Great Tribulation. After that, the
Millennial Dispensation is ushered in, the visible kingdom in which Christ shall
rule upon earth. This begins with Christ’s return with His saints, and the Battle of
Armageddon in which all un-righteousness and iniquity is put down and the
kingdom of righteousness is established. We can see in this short review of the
two dispensations how God, down through the centuries, has been, precept upon
precept, and line upon line, unfolding His plan to mankind and preparing this
great salvation.
You remember the parable of the man who made a great supper and
invited many. When all things were ready he sent out his servants to invite those
who were called. They all with one consent began to make excuses. The host
was angry. He had a right to be. God for centuries has been preparing His “oxen”
and “fatlings”; for centuries the world has been approaching this period in which
all things are ready. Now He gives the grand invitation to the whole round world,
to the whole Gentile nation, and to the Jews. “Behold, all things are ready, come
to the feast.”
“Hear ye Him”
Let us turn to Matthew 17:
“And after six days Jesus taketh Peter, James, and John
his brother, and bringeth them up into an high mountain apart,
“And was transfigured before them: and his face did
shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light.
“And, behold, there appeared unto them Moses and
Elias talking with him.
“Then answered Peter, and said unto Jesus, Lord, it is
good for us to be here: if thou wilt, let us make here three
tabernacles; one for thee, and one for Moses, and one for
Elias.

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 “While he yet spake, behold, a bright cloud
overshadowed them: and behold a voice out of the cloud,
which said, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well
pleased; hear ye him.
“And when the disciples heard it, they fell on their face,
and were sore afraid.
“And Jesus came and touched them, and said, Arise,
and be not afraid.
“And when they had lifted up their eyes, they saw no
man, save Jesus only” (Matthew 17:1-8).
We are living in the fulfillment of this period. A greater than Moses, a
greater than Elijah, is here. The Voice from Heaven said: “This is my beloved
Son, . . .hear ye him.” It was a rebuke to the disciples. Jesus was the One to
whom they were to listen henceforth.
The prophets were like the stars that faded away when the Sun of
righteousness arose with healing in His wings. There are still those today who
want to build tabernacles for Moses and Elijah; but we thank God that the
tabernacle of today is for the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. That was what Moses
had said centuries before: “Him shall ye hear.”
This Epistle to the Hebrews starts out with:
“God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake
in time past unto the fathers by the prophets,
“Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, . . .”
(Hebrews 1:1, 2).
A little farther over in the 12th chapter we read:
“For if they escaped not who refused him that spake on
earth, much more shall not we escape, if we turn away from
him that speaketh from heaven” (Hebrews 12:25).
They who spake on earth were the prophets and the lawgiver; and if
anyone disobeyed the commandments the prophets gave, he was punished at
the mouth of two or three witnesses. “Of how much sorer punishment, suppose
ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God”
(Hebrews 10:29). That is the importance which the writer of this Epistle and God
Himself put upon the Gospel that He has given to the whole round world.
The Mission of Angels
Now we look into the ministry of angels that was taken up in the first
chapter. They have a part in God’s Dispensation of grace as well as in the Old
Testament times. It is not very often alluded to or spoken of, but the Word has
much to say about it. We find some references regarding the angels and their
ministry in Hebrews 1:14; Psalm 91:11; Hebrews 12:22; Daniel 7:10.
We have in the Old Testament numerous references to the “angel of the
Lord” and to “the angel of God.” He appeared unto Abraham, unto Joshua, unto
Balaam; and was sent to guide Israel into the Promised Land. Who do we believe
this angel was? The Lord Jesus Christ Himself.
The angels Gabriel and Michael appeared unto Daniel and spoke to him.
Gabriel appeared unto Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, and announced

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the birth of John. He also appeared unto Mary in the enunciation of the birth of
Christ. So we have two angels mentioned by name, archangels – ruling angels in
Heaven. Then there are the ministering angels in general, as is brought out in the
91st Psalm:
“For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep
thee in all thy ways.
“They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash
thy foot against a stone” (Psalm 91:11, 12).
Jesus, when He was about to be arrested in the Garden, spoke to Peter
when he drew his sword, and said that He had twelve legions of angels at His
command. When He was praying in the Garden, an angel appeared to
strengthen Him; also in Psalm 34:7 we read:
“The angel of the LORD encampeth round about them
that fear him, and delivereth them.”
We have taken up only a few of these references. There are many which
indicate the ministry of angels in their ministering unto the heirs of the promise.
A remarkable instance that has been well vouched for occurred at the time
of the First World War. A few years ago there was a chaplain from overseas, who
had served in France, who spoke at an Easter service on Mount Tabor. Brother
Clasper was present at that service. This chaplain told of some of his
experiences in France. He was commissioned to serve with a detachment at
Mons; and during the period of fighting in that region there was a large body of
English soldiers who became separated from the main army, and were just about
to be surrounded by the enemy. They saw no hope, but they made up their
minds they would not surrender. The enemy was advancing down a long slope
toward them. This chaplain, with thousands of others who were gathered there,
was watching the approach of the enemy. All at once the Germans halted.
Someone spoke behind him and said, “Look!” He turned. He stated that in space
above these soldiers he saw ranks upon ranks of angels, every one of them with
drawn swords. All the soldiers there saw it. The enemy halted and presently
turned and retreated. Thus this whole body of soldiers who expected to be
annihilated were saved. This has been vouched for from more than one source.
There is no question about the ministry of angels. God has sent them for the
protection of His own.

Christ’s Humiliation and Exaltation

----Lesson Four----
The general theme which seems to run through the second chapter of
Hebrews is the humiliation and exaltation of Christ. This chapter opens with the
first exhortation in the Epistle. You will find many of these interspersed
throughout Hebrews.

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 “Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to
the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let
them slip” (Hebrews 2:1).
The word “therefore” refers to the previous chapter – that which was
stated concerning the Person of Christ and His preeminence. If Christ is the
Supreme Being who is set forth in the first chapter, and occupies the
preeminence in God’s universe that the writer sets forth, then how about His
message? That puts upon His message an importance and a preeminence of
equal weight. Therefore this exhortation is given: “Therefore . . . give the more
earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let
them slip.” The things that we have heard are the things which pertain to the
Gospel which He brought, the Gospel of salvation.
Administration of Angels
“For if the word spoken by angels was steadfast, and
every transgression and disobedience received a just
recompense of reward; . . .” (Hebrews 2:2).
Observe that he still continues the theme of the angels. We perhaps find
more in the Epistle to the Hebrews about the place of angels in God’s plan than
in any other part of the Bible. When Stephen was making his speech at the time
of his martyrdom, he said the Law was given by the disposition of angels: “Who
have received the law by the disposition of angels, and have not kept it” (Acts
7:53). And again in Galatians, Paul speaks of the part angels had in giving the
Law:
“Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because
of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the
promise was made; and it was ordained by angels in the hand
of a mediator” (Galatins 3:19).
“The chariots of God are twenty thousand, even
thousands of angels: the Lord is among them, as in Sinai, in
the holy place” (Psalm 68:17).
That, too, indicates that while God gave the Law it was attended by
angels. We have seen all through this Epistle that Paul is contrasting the period
of the Law with the period of the Gospel. In any case, these angels were sent on
missions to this world.
One of them was sent to Lot. When the two men appeared at the gate and
brought him the word of the destruction of the city, their message stood fast.
Every word was fulfilled and judgment was visited upon those wicked people of
Sodom. In every case when angels were sent, the Word of God was carried out
to the letter.
When God Speaks
If that was the case in regard to these created beings, what would be the
case if the Son of God Himself speaks? How much more important it is when He
has come in Person – not through any instrumentality of angels or through any
agent of His. He came to this earth in Person to deliver His message. His
message is inseparably interwoven with His Person. We cannot think of the
message of the Lord Jesus Christ without thinking of His incarnation, His birth,

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the life He lived, the Word He spoke, the acts He did. It is all woven together in
one grand whole, so completely unified that John said, “In the beginning was the
Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1. Therefore,
Jesus and His message are one. One cannot reject any portion of His message
without rejecting Him.
“How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation;
which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was
confirmed unto us by them that heard him” (Hebrews 2:3).
The words in the first verse, “lest at any time we should let them slip,” in
the original have a nautical sense of a ship which is drifting, one that has no
anchorage. That is the exact condition of one who has forsaken the message of
Jesus Christ, the Word of God. He is set adrift; he is tossed to and fro by every
wind of doctrine; he has no stability; he is doubleminded. We have seen those
who have forsaken God. They have become just drifters with nothing sure or
stedfast; or, if they did adhere to any doctrine, it was a false one.
The Word Confirmed
This salvation was spoken first by the Lord and then was confirmed by His
disciples. The writer of Hebrews apparently was Paul who did not know the Lord
in the flesh. He saw Him on the way to Damascus in a vision, and thus he said “
was confirmed unto us by them that heard him.” That was not all. There were
also other confirmations:
“God also bearing them witness, both with signs and
wonders, and with divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost,
according to his own will” (Hebrews 2:4).
As Mark said,
“And they went forth, and preached every where, the
Lord working with them, and confirming the word with signs
following” (Mark 16:20).
He has never left His true disciples destitute of that invaluable affirmation
of the truth of His Word. The seal of their commission as disciples was that
wherever they went, wherever they preached, wherever they declared the
Gospel and held forth this message, signs would follow, confirming the Word
which they spoke. Any body of people who have stood upon that Word and have
dared to declare it and to preach the whole counsel of God have invariably seen
that Word confirmed with signs following. The Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ is
supremely a supernatural Gospel, attended by supernatural power. That is what
separates it and makes it distinct from every other religion: powers that commend
themselves to every man’s conscience. There are certain powers manifested in
false religions, but they are of a nature that in many respects do not commend
themselves to men’s conscience nor even to their common sense. But it is
different with the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. It commends itself to one’s
conscience from beginning to end. This Gospel has been handed down well
confirmed, not only by the religious writers but by confirmation in signs and
miracles. It has been so wherever there has been a people who have preached
the Word of truth.

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 I remember in my own experience that that was the one thing which was a
question in my mind continually. I lived in nominal church circles where I was
seeing none of the signs manifested, and I pondered on that many times. Why, if
the Lord Jesus Christ was the same yesterday, today, and forever, were we not
seeing manifested the same signs, the same miracles which were manifested in
the days of old? Whenever you get away from church forms and ceremonies,
and strike through to where the Spirit of the Lord is manifested, you are going to
see the signs confirming the Word every time.
We read in I Corinthians 6:3:
“Know ye not that we shall judge angels? how much
more things that pertain to this life?”
Not only did Jesus Christ take preeminence over the angels, but according
to the Word, the time is coming when the saints and those who have followed
Him will take preeminence over the angels.
Neglect
The penalty of neglect is put down here — “a just recompence of reward.”
If the transgression of the message of angels received punishment— and we see
how much this Gospel Dispensation in every respect takes precedence over the
Old Dispensation — “Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be
thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted
the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing . . .?”
(Hebrews 10:29).
It means something to turn away from this message, being confirmed as it
is, and coming as it has to this world. The Hebrew Christians were in danger of
turning away because of persecutions and distresses that were confronting them.
They had sore temptations to deal with; but we in this day are in as much danger
of letting the Word slip as they were. We shall never reach the point where we
are past danger of letting the Word slip. And there are other things besides
persecutions and trials or the enticements that these Hebrews had to cause them
to turn back. We have many things in these days which may cause the Word to
slip, by which we may drift away from that Word. All we need to do is to neglect
it, neglect prayer, neglect the attendance of meetings — forsaking the
assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is — giving too much
time to temporal issues, to our own business. All these things can put us into the
very same position into which these Hebrew Christians were in danger of lapsing.
When we see the stern warnings that God has recorded in His Word, not
only against rejecting the Word, but against just neglecting it, we see that it
means something to hold fast to that Word.
Voluntary Humiliation
“For unto the angels hath he not put in subjection the
world to come, whereof we speak.

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 “But one in a certain place testified, saying, What is
man, that thou art mindful of him? or the son of man, that thou
visitest him?” (Hebrews 2:5, 6).
He is quoting from the 8th Psalm. The Psalmist is speaking of the exalted
place for which God has created man. But here the writer of Hebrews has
attributed it directly to the Lord.
“Thou madest him a little lower than the angels; thou
crownedst him with glory and honour, and didst set him over
the works of thy hands” (Hebrews 2:7).
That “little lower than the angels” is brought in contrast with what we had
in the first chapter where He is spoken of as having preeminence over the
angels. He was made a little lower than the angels, voluntarily, in His humility, in
coming down to this world. This has really been attributed to Jesus because He
was the great representative of the human race in His incarnation.
“Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet.
For in that he put all in subjection under him, he left nothing
that is not put under him. But now we see not yet all things put
under him” (Hebrews 2:8).
That has not yet come to pass. Paul, in the 15th chapter of First
Corinthians, tells of the time when all things shall be put in complete subjection
under Him, when the last enemy, death, shall be vanquished.
“But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the
angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and
honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for
every man” (Hebrews 2:9).
He first came down to earth and suffered humiliation temporarily that it
should be followed by His exaltation. First comes the humiliation, and afterward
the exaltation, Peter said, “Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand
of God, that he may exalt you in due time” (I Peter 5:6). That is the order that the
Lord took; and every one of His disciples will take the same road.
David’s Humility, Saul’s Pride
David was anointed king by Samuel, but a long period elapsed before
David was crowned king on the throne. Why? Because he had a schooling to go
through before God was ready to put him there. He had to go through a
“university course” and graduate from it before he was ready to fill the place
which the Lord had for him as king over Israel. One man, Saul, had been put into
that position without going through the course, and the result was that he failed
disastrously. If you will read the experiences that David went through before he
was crowned king, you will confess that he endured some severe lessons. God
does not give His lessons out of text books; He does not assign chapters to us
and have us study our lesson throughout the week and then come and recite it.
He gives us our lessons in the school of experience, in hard knocks, in hard

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places to go through. It was in those hard places that David went through when
he was being pursued by Saul, his life constantly in jeopardy, that David learned
the lesson of humility, to walk softly before the Lord.
Some fail to learn those lessons; they rebel against them. When Saul was
brought to task and rebuked for his faults, instead of receiving it and profiting by
it, he rebelled, with disastrous consequence. He not only lost the kingdom, but he
lost his own soul. He became an outcast and was beset with an evil spirit.
But David took the chastisements which came his way, with the result that
he received a good schooling that prepared and fitted him for his position. He first
had the humiliation and afterward the crown. That is the order that the Lord has
chosen all the way through: not only for His Son whom He sent to this world, but
for every disciple of His; and every one of us takes the same road: first the cross
and then the crown, first the humiliation and then the glory that follows.
Jesus as Prophet and Priest
He speaks here of seeing Jesus crowned with glory and honor. That was after
His ascension. In His coming to this world He fulfilled the office of Prophet. A
prophet is one who speaks for God; he is God’s representative to men. The next
office which He entered upon after He had offered Himself a sacrifice and had
arisen from the dead and ascended on High from the Mount of Olives was the
office of High Priest.
One of the great themes which is taken up in this Epistle is the Priesthood
of Christ. We will turn to Revelation 8. This tells of a glimpse John had of the
Lord.
“And when he had opened the seventh seal, there was
silence in heaven about the space of half an hour”
(Revelation 8:1).
This is the only silence in Heaven, I believe, that is mentioned. It is
because of the sublimity of this scene that is presented here.
“And I saw the seven angels which stood before God;
and to them were given seven trumpets.
“And another angel came and stood at the altar, having
a golden censer; . . .” (Revelation 8:2, 3).
In the Old Testament times the high priest was the only one who had a
golden censer; therefore, this identifies the angel who was standing before the
altar as Jesus Christ, our High Priest.
“. . . and there was given unto him much incense, that
he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden
altar which was before the throne.
“And the smoke of the incense, which came with the
prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the
angel’s hand” (Revelation 8:3, 4).

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 That presents Christ in His office of High Priest. Not only that, but it gives
us the significance of that incense which arose from the Golden Altar that was in
the sanctuary. Therefore the incense signifies prayers. As the Psalmist said, “Let
my prayer be set forth before thee as incense; and the lifting up of my hands as
the evening sacrifice” (Psalm 141:2). What was the purpose of His humiliation
before His exaltation? It was, first, to taste death for every man; in other words,
that He should be a sacrificial offering and take upon Himself the penalty that
justly should fall upon sinful man. Someone had to pay the penalty.
Christ Our Substitute
In the Epistle to the Hebrews we do not have the reason for Christ’s
sacrifice presented. Paul goes into that in his other Epistles, of how it was
necessary that the penalty for sin be met; and Christ in His death met it. We have
clearly set forth here the vicarious sacrifice of the Lord, His substitutionary
offering. It could not be stated more clearly that He should taste death for every
man. His vicarious death is being denied in these days. “Vicarious” means “for
another” — He suffered for another. It is even being denied that it was necessary
that there be such a sacrifice. But here it is written plainly, as well as in many
other portions of the New Testament. To redeem lost humanity and to bring
many sons unto glory was the great object in Jesus’ coming down to this world.
In other words, to share in the glory that He Himself entered into when He
ascended from this world will be the privilege of all those who have followed Him
here below.
Another purpose for Christ’s coming is mentioned here: that He might be
like His brethren. He did not call them servants; He called them brethren. Let us
take up the reason for that.
“. . . in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the
captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings”
(Hebrews 2:10).
The word “captain” is the same word which we find in the 12th chapter
where it speaks of the Author and Finisher of our faith. It means “file leader,” the
one who goes ahead and leads. It is a military picture of one who takes the lead,
and his followers are in his wake. Thus Jesus is set forth as being the Captain,
the Firstfruits of the Resurrection. He went through all this for the supreme
purpose of bringing many sons unto glory.
All One in Christ
“For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified
are all of one” (Hebrews 2:11).
That is what sanctification does; it is that which makes us like Jesus
Christ. As John said:
“Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed
upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore
the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not.

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 “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not
yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall
appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.
“And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth him-
self, even as he is pure” (I John 3:1-3).
That is where the oneness comes in. Jesus prayed that His disciples
might be one, even as He and the Father are one. You see what a perfect
oneness it is, that we be one with Christ as Christ is one with the Father. You can
see how essential it is to be sanctified.
“. . . for which cause he is not ashamed to call them
brethren” (Hebrews 2:11).
You remember the incident when His mother and brethren came to inquire
for Him. That is in Matthew 12:46-50.
“While he yet talked to the people, behold, his mother
and his brethren stood without, desiring to speak with him.
“Then one said unto him, Behold, thy mother and thy
brethren stand without, desiring to speak with thee.
“But he answered and said unto him that told him, Who
is my mother? and who are my brethren?
“And he stretched forth his hand toward his disciples,
and said, Behold my mother and my brethren!
“For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is
in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother.”
This is the filial bond which He expects us to have with the Lord Jesus
Christ. Is it any wonder that the Gospel and all that it means to us should be
more precious than family ties or anything else that could arise? We, by being
partakers of His divine nature, are bone of His bone and flesh of His flesh. It is
the great mystery of godliness that through this plan which God has ordained,
His Son’s coming to the earth and offering Himself a sacrifice, we are made
partakers of His divine nature, having escaped the corruption which is in the
world.
I hope that the study of this Epistle to the Hebrews will enlarge our vision
of the Gospel, that it will give us a wider range of God’s calling, of its heights and
depths, and inspire us to rededicate and consecrate our lives anew to the Lord.
When we think of the extent to which God has gone to meet the needs of sinful
humanity, covering not a short period but centuries of time, unfolding His plan as
He has, we can begin to glimpse the importance of this great salvation of which
we are made partakers.
“Saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the
midst of the church will I sing praise unto thee.

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 “And again, I will put my trust in him. And again, Behold
I and the children which God hath given me”
(Hebrews 2:12, 13).
Christ’s Yearning Heart of Love
We can understand the heart of the Savior as He was upon the mountain
overlooking Jerusalem about the last time He surveyed the city, and cried that
lamentable cry:
“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets,
and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I
have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth
her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!”
(Matthew 23:37).
It was not that they could not; but that they would not. He had the love; the
yearning was there; there was no lack upon His part. The lack was on the human
side. They had failed to respond to the love that He had manifested in coming to
this world.
“Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh
and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that
through death he might destroy him that had the power of
death, that is, the devil” (Hebrews 2:14).
Satan’s power is through sin. He is over the realm of death because of sin,
by which death was ushered into this world. There was no death in the world until
sin entered.
The Fear of Death
“And deliver them who through fear of death were all
their lifetime subject to bondage” (Hebrews 2:15).
In Old Testament times even the patriarchs who lived near to God seemed
to cleave unto this present life. There was a certain amount of temporal blessing
which accrued to Israel, God’s people in those days, and they were part of God’s
promise to Israel. They seemed to long to live to a good old age and to be buried
in honor with their fathers. This followed through the whole line of Israel’s history.
When Hezekiah was sick unto death, the Lord told him to put his house in order
for he should die and not live. He turned his face to the wall and wept before the
Lord and prayed that his life be spared; and God added fifteen years to his life. In
the New Dispensation in which we live that fear is dispelled for the Christian.
The sting of death is sin, and when sin is taken away the sting is taken
away also. There is not the fear in the people of God that seems to have
attended the Old Dispensation. I think it was said of Moody that he was in the
midst of a red-hot revival campaign when he was stricken and carried to his
hotel. When he knew death was inevitable, his last words were that “earth is

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receding and Heaven is drawing nigh.” There was not a tremor in that warrior of
the Cross when he came to his end.
“For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but
he took on him the seed of Abraham” (Hebrews 2:16).
A Merciful High Priest
The Lord might well have chosen a lesser being in Heaven, Michael, or
Gabriel, or one of the archangels, to come down to this world to bring the
message of salvation. He sent them as messengers in olden times. But had such
a messenger come, we might well have said, “He could not understand the
position in which we are placed. This angel knows nothing about the temptations
that you and I are subject to. He knows nothing about the infirmities of the flesh
which beset us, the weaknesses with which we are confronted day by day, nor
the allurements of the world, the flesh and the devil.” But God did not send such
a messenger. He sent the Lord Jesus Christ, not as an angel, but of the seed of
Abraham:
“Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like
unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high
priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for
the sins of the people” (Hebrews 2:17).
“For we have not an high priest which cannot be
touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points
tempted like as we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15).
Let us turn to Philippians 2:5.
“Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ
Jesus:
“Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery
to be equal with God:
“But made himself of no reputation . . .”
(Philippians 2:5-7).
If we have Christ, we have His mind.
He was not made of “no reputation” but He made Himself of no reputation.
He said upon one occasion that no man took His life from Him; He laid down His
life and took it up again. His humiliation from beginning to end was voluntary. He
could have turned from it at any time, even in the crisis in the Garden. He prayed
the Father that if it were possible, to let that cup pass from Him; but He
immediately added, “Nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done” (Luke 22:42).
This shows that it was perfectly voluntary upon His part to go through with it or
turn aside from it, just as it is with us in following Him.
“. . . and took upon him the form of a servant, and was
made in the likeness of men” (Philippians 2:7).

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 He told His disciples, “For even the Son of man came not to be ministered
unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45).
“And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled
himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of
the cross.
“Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given
him a name which is above every name:
“That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of
things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the
earth;
“And that every tongue should confess that Jesus
Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father”
(Philippians 2:8-11).
That reminds us of the Psalmist who closed the Book of Psalms with an
anthem of praise and said, “Let every thing that hath breath praise the LORD”
(Psalm 150:6). That day is coming. He has thus been exalted. Let us turn to First
Peter 1:10:
“Of which salvation the prophets have inquired and
searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should
come unto you:
“Searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of
Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified
beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should
follow.
“Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves,
but unto us they did minister the things, which are now
reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto
you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; which things
the angels desire to look into.
“Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and
hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at
the revelation of Jesus Christ” (I Peter 1:10-13).
Paul said: “For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though
he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty
might be rich” (II Corinthians 8:9). We see the great purpose that Jesus had in
forsaking all, making Himself of no reputation. That literally means emptying
Himself of all the glory, of all the power, of all that He had, to come down to this
earth and become a servant among men. He suffered the contradiction of
sinners, went to the Cross, endured death there and ascended on High, that He
might bring many sons unto the Lord. We can thank God we are of that body. I
wish sometimes, as I get glimpses of the heights and depths and breadths of the

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Gospel, that I had words to express it. Perhaps sometime we may, like William
Cowper, the writer of the song which says:
“Then in a nobler, sweeter song
I’ll sing Thy power to save,
When this poor lisping, stammering tongue
Lies silent in the grave.”
We have taken up Christ’s offices of Prophet and Priest. There is another
office to fulfill when He comes as King. That remains yet to be fulfilled. He is on
His mediatorial Throne now. When this age ends, He will leave that Throne. We
believe the period of Grace ends with the coming of the Lord, because of His
leaving that mediatorial Throne and taking upon Himself the final office of King.
The priests entered within the veil to make atonement for the people.
Christ entered into death that He might atone for us. in Hebrews we read that He
was made a “better priest.” A great portion of this Epistle to the Hebrews is
devoted to His Priesthood. It is one of the most interesting studies concerning
Jesus Christ.

The Apostleship and

Priesthood of Christ
----Lesson Five----
We now take the third chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews. The subject
is announced in the first verse: The Apostleship and Priesthood of Christ. The
latter part of the chapter is in the form of an exhortation which has to do with
entering into His rest.
We will take up first the introduction. It starts with “wherefore,” referring to
what has gone before. This refers us to the previous chapter: “Wherefore, holy
brethren,” the ones he is addressing.
You will find that as we go on in this Epistle there is not a word lost, not a
word spoken at random. The very title that he has given them of “holy brethren”
refers us to the 11th verse of the previous chapter. They were holy because they
were sanctified; and they were brethren because
“. . . he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are
all of one: for which cause he is not ashamed to call them
brethren.”
The writer has drawn his salutation from the points that he has already
made. You will find the method of this writer straight through is to base one point

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upon another as he goes along. That is why it is one of the most wonderful
pieces of literature to be found in the Word of God.
“Partakers of the heavenly calling.” He is here contrasting the Old
Dispensation with the New; so he traces the calling. The heavenly calling is
contrasted with the comparatively earthly calling of the Israelites under the Old
Dispensation. The Israelites held out for their blessings, largely material,
terrestrial blessings: the promise of the land of Canaan. The Lord would bless
them materially in that land.
Men of God like Abraham, Moses, and Joshua, who walked with God, saw
the spiritual beyond the material. Nevertheless, the blessings to Israel were
largely material. Someone has suggested that there was a thought of this kind to
be drawn in the fact that God pointed Abraham to “the sand which is by the sea
shore innumerable” and to “the stars of the sky,” the sands of the sea being
Israel according to the flesh, and the stars of the heavens being Israel according
to the Spirit. There is a significance in the choice of words that is made in
Scripture.
The Jews were the “sandy” Jews according to the flesh; and we who are
of the seed of Abraham by faith, are the “starry Jews.” He says, “Consider the
Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus.” That word “consider”
means to study earnestly, deeply. It is put in the most emphatic form. The
apostleship and priesthood are two of the subjects which form a large part of this
Epistle.
Sent of God
Who is an Apostle? From the etymology of the word it means: one who is
sent. It comes from the Greek word “apostello,” which means “to send.” In the
Scriptural sense it means one sent by God. Jesus has much to say about His
Apostleship. It is not put under that specific title, but throughout the Gospels He
speaks thirty-two times of Him who sent Him. He bases the authority of His
ministry on the fact of His being sent. The twelve Apostles were sent by Jesus. In
John 20:21, we read: “Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so
send I you.”
Some of the choicest Scriptures to be found throughout the Gospels are
those dealing with His having been sent.
“He that receiveth you receiveth me, and he that
receiveth me receiveth him that sent me” (Matthew 10:40).
“For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn
the world; but that the world through him might be saved”
(John 3:17).
“For he whom God hath sent speaketh the words of
God: [that falls perfectly in line with the opening of this
Epistle!] for God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto him”
(John 3:34).

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 There was no limitation to the Spirit that was poured out upon the Son of
God when He was baptized and the Holy Ghost appeared in the form of a dove.
“Jesus saith unto them, My meat is to do the will of him
that sent me, and to finish his work” (John 4:34).
“That all men should honour the Son, even as they
honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth
not the Father which hath sent him” (John 5:23).
Those are just a few of the passages of Scripture having to do with the
fact of Jesus’ being sent as an Apostle. So we may say that an Apostle is one
sent by God to represent God before men.
Christ’s Priesthood
He also speaks here of His Priesthood. The office of a priest is to
represent men before God. It is the opposite of that of an Apostle. A priest is one
appointed by God to represent men before God. Christ’s Priesthood is by far the
largest subject dealt with in the Epistle. It is first intimated in Hebrews 1:3:
“Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express
image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of
his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down
on the right hand of the Majesty on high.”
We see that there are intimations of these great subjects which he later
takes up and goes into in detail. Again in Hebrews 2:9:
“But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the
angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and
honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for
every man.”
This is an intimation of His Priesthood in offering Himself as a sacrifice for
man. The 11th verse:

“For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified

are all of one: for which cause he is not ashamed to call them
brethren.”
To the priests pertained the matter of purification and sanctification in their
duties about the Temple or Tabernacle. The 17th verse contains the heart of the
whole thing:
“Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like
unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high
priest [This is the first time this expression is used in the
Epistle.] in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for
the sins of the people.”
This term “high priest” occurs 17 times throughout the Epistle; but not
once does it occur in any of the other Epistles. You can see that this Epistle to

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the Hebrews stands out largely in setting forth the offices of Jesus Christ: “That
he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make
reconciliation for the sins of the people.” In Proverbs 16:6 we read: “By mercy
and truth iniquity is purged.” Without mercy and truth there can be no purging of
sin. When we take into account that Paul here was writing to the Hebrews and
contrasting the Old Dispensation with the New, we can see how forcibly he was
bringing out that in Christ Jesus they had a merciful and faithful High Priest; for
the Aaronic priesthood, after Aaron, had signally failed in this very thing. They
were not very merciful to men, nor were they faithful to God. That unfaithfulness
began at a very early period, in the time of Eli.
In the Herodian epoch, in the time when Jesus lived, the high priests were
notorious for their cruelty, their insolence and their greed. There were 28 high
priests in 107 years of this period and their brief tenure of office was due to their
wickedness. You can see how forcibly the writer is bringing before them the pre-
eminence of the priesthood under Christ. He was a merciful and faithful High
Priest, such as they had never had under the old order.
“Who was faithful to him that appointed him, . . .”
See how he is bringing up the very point which he made in the previous
chapter, that of a faithful high priest.
“. . . as also Moses was faithful in all his house”
(Hebrews 3:2).
The Apostle and the Prophet
Here starts the comparison of Jesus Christ as an Apostle, with Moses as a
prophet. There is no difference between an Apostle and a prophet in their
function. Moses was “one sent”; and a prophet is one who speaks for another.
The prophets were those who spoke for God; they brought His message to men.
In the opening of this Epistle the writer compared Jesus Christ in His
eternity with the angels because His associates in Glory were angels. But now in
His humiliation He compares Him with Moses, a man on earth, because men are
now His associates. He came down to walk among men. How logically this writer
follows his theme from one step to another! Later on we will find that Christ, as a
priest, is compared with Aaron. Christ was both the Moses and the Aaron of the
New Dispensation — the two offices taken up in one.
As an Apostle, He, like Moses, pleaded God’s cause; and as a High Priest
He, like Aaron, pleaded our cause with God. You remember the high priest of old
had the name “Jehovah” written on his golden mitre, so that when he came
before Israel he came as a man representing God. He also bore on his breast the
names of the tribes of Israel, so that when he went in before God he would stand
as their representative and plead their cause. So in Christ we have both the
Apostle and the High Priest of our profession.
His Faithfulness

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 “Who was faithful to him that appointed him.” That faithfulness of the Lord
Jesus Christ is the theme that is carried throughout the entire Epistle; “As also
Moses was faithful in all his house.” That points back to Numbers 12:6,7, where
Aaron and Miriam spoke against Moses. The Lord spoke out of Heaven and
called all three of them, Moses, Aaron, and Miriam, over to the Tabernacle:
“And he said, Hear now my words: If there be a prophet
among you, I the LORD will make myself known unto him in a
vision, and will speak unto him in a dream.
“My servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all mine
house.”
It was directly from this verse of Scripture that the writer has drawn his
comparison between Moses and Jesus. You can see that if Moses held the
exalted place among the prophets which is set forth here, and then Jesus Christ
takes pre-eminence over him, what an exalted station He is put into in Scripture!
In fact, among the Jews, Moses was the great character of the Old Testament.
There was no other man who was looked up to, who was commemorated and
celebrated among the Jews, like Moses. For a good reason: he stands out as
their deliverer out of Egyptian bondage; he stands out as their lawgiver, and as
their first prophet. The Lord chose him and singled him out from all the prophets
by the manner in which He made Himself known unto Moses.
“My servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all mine
house.
“With him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently,
and not in dark speeches; and the similitude of the LORD shall
he behold: wherefore then were ye not afraid to speak against
my servant Moses?” (Numbers 12:7, 8).
Christ the Builder
He goes on to say that “he that built all things is God.” We can say that is
Christ, because in this Epistle he has already said that by Him were the worlds
made. John also said, “All things were made by him; and without him was not
any thing made that was made” (John 1:3). This house of God spoken of here is
the Church. The house that is spoken of in Numbers is the Israelites. Israel was
God’s house under the Old Testament. It was not the Tabernacle, neither was it
the Temple; it was God’s people who constituted His house.
Christ is here set forth as being the Builder, or Establisher, of this house,
so that Moses was the appointed servant over the house which Jesus Christ
Himself established. What place does that put Jesus in as compared with
Moses? It says:
“For every house is builded by some man; but he that
built all things is God.

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 “And Moses verily was faithful in all his house, as a
servant, for a testimony of those things which were to be
spoken after;
“But Christ as a son over his own house; whose house
are we, . . .” (Hebrews 3:4-6).
He is speaking here of the present dispensation, the church of this present
period; not in structure of stone with Gothic architecture or with stained glass
windows. That does not constitute the Church; neither is it the elaborate
organization with its board of deacon’s and elders; neither is it the polity of
worship which they have adopted, and the forms and ceremonies which they go
through. What constitutes Christ’s Church is Christ’s people.
Relationship of Christ to the Church
Let us turn to Genesis 28:13. This was when Jacob was taking his journey
to Haran, when he was fleeing from the wrath of his brother Esau. He came at
sundown upon this spot at Bethel and lay down to sleep. He took a stone and
placed it for his pillow. He had a dream that night and saw a ladder set up, and
angels ascending and descending upon it.
“And, behold, the LORD stood above it, and said, I am
the LORD God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac:
the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy
seed” (Genesis 28:13).
There He repeats the promise that was made to Abraham. It is very
interesting to note that the dream which Jacob had forms the basis of that
beautiful old-time hymn “Nearer, My God, to Thee.’
“Tho’ like the wanderer,
The sun gone down,
Darkness be over me
My rest a stone,
Yet in my dreams I’d be
Nearer, my God, to Thee.”
“And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely
the LORD is in this place; and I knew it not.
“And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place!
this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of
heaven.
“And Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the
stone that he had put for his pillows, and set it up for a pillar,
and poured oil upon the top of it.

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 “And he called the name of that place Beth-el”
(Genesis 28:16-19).
There was just one man and God and the stone that Jacob set up, and he
called that the house of God. Why? Because that was the place where God met
him. God’s house is the place where God meets with men. That is why the
Church is His people. In the New Dispensation the Church is God’s house. Paul
tells us in First Timothy 3:15: “. . . the house of God, which is the church of the
living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.”
There are some beautiful similes brought out in the Scriptures to make
plain the relationship of Jesus Christ to His Church.
In the 10th chapter of John, the Church of God is likened unto a sheepfold
of which Jesus is the Good Shepherd and we are His sheep. The relationship
that Jesus bears to His sheep is a much closer relationship than Moses ever
bore to the Children of Israel. Moses was a servant, but the Lord Jesus Christ is
a Shepherd over His fold.
Again in the 15th chapter of John, the Church is likened unto a vine and its
branches, of which Christ is the True Vine, and we are the branches. There is set
up between Jesus Christ and His disciples a relationship of life. As the branch is
attached to the vine, so we are attached to Christ. This is a relationship that the
Israelites never bore to Moses.
In Ephesians 4:15, 16, the Church is likened unto the human body, of
which Christ is the Head and we are the members. Paul brings it out beautifully
that all the members function in perfect harmony, one with the other. So it is in
the ideal Church of Christ: perfect unity. No one member can be dispensed with;
each one has his own place and his own function; and Christ is the Head of it all.
You can see how utterly helpless the Church, Which is the body of Christ, would
be were it severed from the Head. What would it be? A corpse. That is what has
happened to the nominal church because it has become severed from its Head.
Again, the Church is likened unto a building of which Christ is the Chief
Corner Stone and we are lively or living stones. That is in I Peter 2:4-9. Christ is
the Corner Stone which was rejected by the builders, but has been made the
Head of the corner. That is taken from the 118th Psalm where it says that the
stone which the builders rejected became the head of the corner. He was
rejected and was crucified, but was resurrected and became the Chief Corner
Stone of the Church established on the Day of Pentecost.
Continuing unto the End
“But Christ as a son over his own house; whose house
are we, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the
hope firm unto the end” (Hebrews 3:6).
That is one in the solar plexus for the doctrine of eternal security. “If we
hold fast the confidence,” you will find to be one of the themes that is carried
through this Epistle, “and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end.” That is the

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only kind of eternal security that is set forth in the Scripture. It is conditioned upon
our steadfastness, upon our enduring unto the end. There is no hope of ever
making it through except upon those terms. That is why this solemn exhortation
was given to the Hebrews who were upon the verge of apostatizing.
The writer of the Hebrews brings up as an example the case of the
Israelites in the wilderness who provoked the Lord through their unbelief.
“While it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden
not your hearts, as in the provocation.
“For some, when they had heard, did provoke: howbeit
not all that came out of Egypt by Moses.
“But with whom was he grieved forty years? was it not
with them that had sinned, whose carcases fell in the
wilderness?” (Hebrews 3:15-17).
That is quoted from the 95th Psalm, which refers to the backslidings of the
Children of Israel. You notice He says here, “As the Holy Ghost saith.” How
careful the New Testament writers are to attribute to the Spirit of God all that was
written. They do not say, “David wrote it.” They use the term, “Well spake the
Holy Ghost by Esaias . . .” or “The Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake.”
“Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the
day of temptation in the wilderness:
“When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw
my works forty years” (Hebrews 3:8, 9).
That is all quoted from the 95th Psalm. He uses this example as an
exhortation to the Hebrew Christians.
“Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil
heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.
“But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day;
lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.
“For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the
beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end”
(Hebrews 3:12-14).
Could any teaching be more clearly stated than that? Those are the terms
on which you and I may expect to make the goal In the end.
“While it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden
not your hearts, as in the provocation” (Hebrews 3:15).
What was that provocation to which he is referring particularly? It was at
Massah and Meribah. “Massah” means temptation. It was after they had crossed
the Red Sea.

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 “And all the congregation of the children of Israel
journeyed from the wilderness of Sin, after their journeys,
according to the commandment of the LORD, and pitched in
Rephidim: and there was no water for the people to drink.
“Wherefore the people did chide with Moses, and said,
Give us water that we may drink. And Moses said unto them,
Why chide ye with me? wherefore do ye tempt the LORD?
“And the people thirsted there for water; and the people
murmured against Moses, and said, Wherefore is this that thou
hast brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and
our cattle with thirst?
“And Moses cried unto the LORD, saying, What shall I
do unto this people? they be almost ready to stone me.
“And the LORD said unto Moses, Go on before the
people, and take with thee of the elders of Israel; and thy rod,
wherewith thou smotest the river, take in thine hand, and go.
“Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in
Horeb; and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come
water out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so in
the sight of the elders of Israel.
“And he called the name of the place Massah, and
Meribah, because of the chiding of the children of Israel, and
because they tempted the LORD, saying, Is the LORD among
us, or not?” (Exodus 17:1-7).
This is the incident to which Paul is referring:
“For some, when they had heard, did provoke: howbeit
not all that came out of Egypt by Moses.
“But with whom was he grieved forty years? was it not
with them that had sinned, whose carcases fell in the
wilderness?
“And to whom sware he that they should not enter into
his rest, but to them that believed not?
“So we see that they could not enter in because of
unbelief” (Hebrews 3:16-19).
There were 600,000 men, besides women and children, who left Egypt —
perhaps three million in all. What of that great army of adults who came out?
Only two entered into Canaan. All the rest bleached their bones in the
wilderness. It was only five days from the time they left Egypt to the time they
came to the plain of Sinai. The remainder of the forty years were spent between
Sinai and the Promised Land in their wanderings. That is what they suffered for
getting out of the order of the Lord.

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 Scripture states that in the third month, on the third day of the month, they
came to Sinai. They were two days sanctifying themselves; and on that day
appeared the smoke, and the Lord came down upon Mount Sinai and gave the
Law. If you figure from the fifteenth day of Nisan, the Passover, to the third
month, you will find that makes just 50 days. Things do not happen at random
with the Lord. From the Passover, when Jesus was crucified, to the Day of
Pentecost, was also 50 days.
There is a wonderful correspondence between the Old and New
Dispensation. No wonder this writer brings out that the Old was a shadow of the
New all the way through. They were living under the shadow, but we thank God
we are under the substance!

An Exhortation to Steadfastness
----Lesson Six----
Beginning with the 7th verse of the 3rd chapter of Hebrews Paul
introduces another one of the numerous exhortations which are found in this
Epistle. This is one of the most solemn exhortations of the Epistle to the
Hebrews, extending from the 7th verse of the 3rd chapter to the 14th verse of the
4th chapter. It is an exhortation to steadfastness, drawn from the example of the
Israelites in the wilderness; and is expounded by the Psalmist in the 91st Psalm.
The author is very fond of quoting the Psalmist. There are eleven Psalms quoted
in this Epistle.
In the history of the Israelites, to teach them a lesson, the Psalmist took up
the period of their wanderings in the wilderness; and the writer of the Hebrews
takes it up again to teach a lesson to the Hebrew Christians to whom he is
writing.
Murmuring and Complaining
We know of the murmurings of the Children of Israel during their
wanderings. Their first uprising was at the border of the Red Sea where they said
to Moses, “Because there were no graves in Egypt, hast thou taken us away to
die in the wilderness?” They said that to Moses, but God heard it. Nevertheless,
God brought them through the Red Sea on dry ground.
That was one of the outstanding experiences in Israel to which the writer,
the Psalmists, and the prophets all looked as being one of the great deliverances
in Israel’s history. But they were scarcely out of sight of that great miracle when
they came into a desert place and murmured for bread.
God performed another miracle, sending them manna from Heaven, which
rained down daily for a period of 40 years. God’s care over them in providing that
manna never ceased until they crossed over Jordan and went into the Promised

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Land where they had food. It was a constant reminder of God’s providential care
over them, of His miraculous provision for them.
Shortly after this they were out in the desert where they had no water.
Again they murmured, and again the Lord came to their rescue, and commanded
Moses to smite the rock, and water came forth. Then they came up to Mount
Sinai, and while Moses was up in the mount for a period of 40 days they said:
“Up, make us gods, which shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man that
brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him”
(Exodus 32:1).
The golden calf was cast and there they were dancing around it. Farther
along they tired of the manna, the heavenly food which God was sending them,
and murmured for flesh. God sent quail which rained down until they covered the
earth for a space round about the camp. The Lord fed them on flesh until it came
out at their nostrils, and they were stricken with a very great plague because they
had complained that they had no meat.
The next great murmuring on the part of Israel, and the thing which
brought this murmuring to a crisis, was when the twelve spies returned with their
evil report. They found the land everything the Lord had said it was: a land
flowing with milk and honey. They brought back samples of the fruit. But while
they were investigating the truth of what God had said about the land, they found
some other things. There were highwalled cities and giants, and that meant a
conquest of those nations in order to take the land.
Ten of the spies said they could never do it; but two were of another spirit.
Caleb said, “We are well able to overcome it.” But murmuring spread throughout
the camp; the hearts of the people were discouraged by the evil report. The
result was that the Lord said to Moses, “How long will this people provoke me?”
He said that they had provoked Him ten times. There are six times recorded
here.
The Lord swore that those who were of age when they came out of Egypt
should not enter into the land; but their children (who they said would perish in
the wilderness) He would bring in — and He did. This rebellion occurred about
two years after they had come out of the land of Egypt. Because of their rebellion
at this time they had thirty-eight years of wanderings still to endure in the
wilderness.
This is the great provocation to which the Psalmist referred and which the
writer of Hebrews quotes. He brings it forth to enforce a lesson upon the Hebrew
Christians; and it may well be a lesson to us today.
In I Corinthians 10, Paul again refers to the Children of Israel in the
wilderness and says:
“Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be
ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all
passed through the sea;

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 “And were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in
the sea;
“And did all eat the same spiritual meat;
“And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they
drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock
was Christ” (I Corinthians 10:1-4).
It was more than a likeness; that rock in the wilderness was a shadow of
the Rock in the weary land which the Lord was going to send into this world of
sin.
Examples for Us
“But with many of them God was not well pleased: for
they were overthrown in the wilderness.
“Now these things were our examples. . .”
(I Corinthians 10:5, 6).
We have a right, therefore, on the authority of God’s Word, to use the Old
Testament and the lessons which it brings forth as our examples.
“. . . to the intent we should not lust after evil things, as
they also lusted.
“Neither be ye idolaters, as were some of them; as it is
written, The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to
play.
“Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them
committed, and fell in one day three and twenty thousand..
“Neither let us tempt Christ, as some of them also
tempted, and were destroyed of serpents.
“Neither murmur ye, as some of them also murmured,
and were destroyed of the destroyer.
“Now all these things happened unto them for
ensamples: (I Corinthians 10:6-11).
The Lord did not bring that about purposely just to give us examples; but
since by their choice, and by the route they took, these things happened, they
therefore became our examples.
“. . . and they are written for our admonition, upon whom
the ends of the world are come.
“Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed
lest he fall” (I Corinthians 10:11-12).
We have a splendid example of the New Testament writers using the
historical incidents and the successes and failures of God’s people as

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admonitions, examples, inspirational warnings for us today. We have a fine
example in this particular exhortation given here of the exegesis or expounding of
the Old Testament Scripture.
Backsliding
“Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil
heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God”
(Hebrews 3:12).
That word “departing” from God is the very word from which we get the
word “apostasy,” to “fall away.” That is what it means: a back sliding from God to
the extent that it becomes chronic, fixed, unchangeable. When a man is in that
state he has a reprobate mind. The Word of God teaches that it is possible for
those who once had the light, and had known the truth of God’s Word, to reach
such a state.
We have a comment by a very devout man living in Wesley’s time upon
this particular point which I want to quote:
“These words [extending from the 7th verse to the end of the chapter]
strongly imply, as indeed does the whole of the Epistle, the possibility of falling
from the grace of God and perishing everlastingly. And without this supposition
these words and all such like, which make more than two-thirds of the divine
revelation, would have neither sense nor meaning. What contemptible quibbling
have men used to maintain a false and dangerous tenet against the whole tenor
of God’s Word. Angels fell, Adam fell, Solomon fell, and multitudes of believers
have fallen, and for all we know, are no more. And yet we are told we cannot
finally lose the benefits of our conversion. Satan preached this doctrine to our
first parents; they believed him, sinned and fell and brought a whole world to
ruin.”
I thought that was a very strong point against this erroneous doctrine of
Eternal Security that is being preached so energetically these days.
A Promised Rest
“So I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest”
(Hebrews 3:11).
Of course this word “rest” has reference to Canaan. It did not mean that
when they reached Canaan they would be idle, because they were not. They had
conquests; but it did mean that with the completion of their conquests they
should enjoy peace and the blessings of the land of Canaan. There were
vineyards which they had not planted, olive groves for which they had not
labored, cities which they had not built. That is the rest that God had promised for
them in the land of Canaan.
There is an earthly rest typical of a heavenly rest that God has provided
for His children. That is the theme which the writer is taking up in this particular
place. Our heavenly rest is no more an experience of an idle rest than is the
experience of the Children of Israel in the land of Canaan. For my part, I believe

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that we are going to work in that Beautiful Land that God has promised to His
own. What the nature of it is we do not know; it is left a mystery. But there is one
thing about it, we will have a body; these vile bodies changed into the likeness of
the glorified body of our Lord and Savior. Thus we will be able to worship Him.
We would not be able in these physical bodies to endure the rapture or the joys
of that Land. We will enjoy its blessings just as Israel was to be brought into the
Promised Land to enjoy those blessings.
The blessings God has promised the faithful are beyond human
conception, as Paul tells us: “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have
entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that
love him” (I Corinthians 2:9). John, on the Isle of Patmos, caught a glimpse of
those blessings, and it was hard for him to find human language by which they
could be described and brought within the range of our finite minds. So great are
those blessings!
The Murmurings of the Children of Israel
The Israelites who perished shut themselves out of those blessings
voluntarily. It was possible for them to enter in; but when they came to the border
of the land and saw the difficulties and obstacles that they confronted, what little
faith they had failed, and they could no longer see the mighty Jehovah with His
arm laid bare. All they could see were giants, high walled cities — obstacles
against their entering into the land.
They forgot about the miracles wrought, the plagues that were sent upon
Egypt, the crossing of the Red Sea, the manna from Heaven, the water that was
brought out of the rock, and numerous other miracles that were wrought along
the entire path of their journey. The result was that they were turned back into the
wilderness. The Lord swore that they should not go on.
They indeed made an attempt to go in, but the Lord was not with them.
They were like those who tried to climb up some other way. There is only one
way to go in, and that is the way the Lord has prescribed. Therefore they turned
back for thirty-eight more years of wanderings in the wilderness. The fact that
their carcasses fell in the wilderness was not any arbitrary judgment that the Lord
sent upon them; it was simply the logical conclusion, the choice they had made.
All who were 20 years of age and older when they left Egypt perished in the
wilderness, except Caleb and Joshua.
It has always been a little band who has followed the Lord. Jesus said,
“Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the
kingdom” (Luke 12:32). We had better see to it that we belong to the “little flock.”
“For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the
beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end”
(Hebrews 3:14).
See the conditions for entering in. Not all who start in the race finish it. The
all-important thing is to finish that race; then everybody will know that you have
started in it. That word “confidence” means foundation. There is no danger of the

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foundation’s giving away; that foundation is sure. That foundation is Christ, for no
other foundation can any man lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.
We are founded upon that foundation by the experience which we have
through Him. It means becoming established upon the foundation that is already
laid. That foundation will never give way nor ever weaken; it is sounder than the
eternal hills. But there is a danger of slipping from our foundation. More than one
has done that. The very first exhortation this writer gives us is a warning against
that.
“Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to
the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let
them slip” (Hebrews 2:1).
And in letting them slip we let our foundation slip. That is what too many
have permitted.
Believe or Perish
“While it is said, To day. . .” (Hebrews 3:15).
That word “today” means the present time. It was in the day that the
Psalmist wrote; it was for the Hebrew day that Paul wrote; and it is for you and
me in the day in which we live. The Lord recognizes an ever-present “today”
throughout His Word. It was that same thing which Paul meant when he said,
“Now is the day of salvation.”
None of us have any assurance of tomorrow. The only thing we are sure
of is the present.
“For some, when they had heard, did provoke: howbeit
not all that came out of Egypt by Moses” (Hebrews 3:16).
This is a little difficult to understand. There is another way in which that
might be translated and be just as true, and that is put it in the form of a question.
“Who therefore that heard did provoke, but not all that came out of Egypt?” We
might say all, with the exception of two.
“And to whom sware he that they should not enter into
his rest, but to them that believed not?” (Hebrews 3:18).
Unbelief was at the bottom of all the trouble of the Children of Israel in the
wilderness. That is what is at the bottom of the world’s trouble today. Unbelief
started in the Garden of Eden when Satan said to our forefathers, “Hath God
said?” and inserted that question in their minds; and it has been a question in the
unregenerated mind from that day on. We have all inherited the nature of our
forefathers. From that springs all the sin and iniquity and woe to which this world
is heir. Unbelief!
Falling Short
In the 4th chapter Paul is talking about a Sabbath of grace as a type of
heavenly rest. As God rested from labor so hath He provided a Sabbath of rest

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for His people — eternal rest, of which entering into Canaan was just a
foreshadow.
“Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of
entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of
it” (Hebrews 4:1).
That word translated “come short” is taken from the Greek games which
were held. If any man came short of winning the contest, this was the word which
was applied. A man, no matter how little he might have failed — if he came short
only by a fraction — was ruled out; he was not a winner. The writer has very
appropriately chosen that word because all one has to do is to lack a little of
making the goal, and he has failed.
Hearing the Word
“For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto
them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being
mixed with faith in them that heard it” (Hebrews 4:2).
That word “mixed” is taken as a figure from the digestive processes. Just
as food is taken into the digestive system and is mixed with the elements that the
body furnishes before it can be assimilated, so must the Word of God be properly
mixed before it can be assimilated and become part of the soul.
We see here what is necessary in order to profit by the hearing of the
Word. What a difference there can be among people who hear the same Word!
There were four classes of people given in the parable of the sower. The same
seed was sown in four instances — and there was nothing wrong with the seed.
There is nothing wrong with the Word. It was the hearing that was wrong. With
some it did not profit at all; with some it profited a little but soon perished. With
others it profited a little more, but owing to the cares and the pleasure of this life it
was choked. Then there was the good soil which truly profited: some thirty, some
sixty and some one hundredfold.
Thus we find it down through the entire course of the history of humanity.
Some are profiting by it and some are not. What is the difference? In some it has
not been properly mixed — just as it was with those Children of Israel in the
wilderness. They had spiritual indigestion. The Word that was given has all the
essential properties for nourishment. It has the vitamins, the calories, the
minerals and everything else, so to speak. It is lacking in nothing. The Word of
God is perfect.
Sufficient Grace and Faith
There is no circumstance in life but that has its parallel somewhere in the
Word of God. That is one of the great advantages in studying that Old
Testament: all the things that the Children of Israel went through find a parallel in
a Christian’s experience. It takes the same steadfastness, the same faith, the
same belief, the same courage, the same purpose in the Christian to make the

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goal that it took in these Israelites to enter the land of Canaan, and complete the
conquest of it.
We likewise have a conquest before us, and a land to take. In order to go
through successfully, it is going to require the same virtues in your life and mine
that were required in the lives of those Israelites. The Word of God furnishes all
the examples, precepts, commandments, exhortations, encouragements, and
inspirations which the Christian needs.
It is necessary for us to have some other faculties than our brain, other
powers than our intellectual powers, if we are going to study profitably this Word.
The study of God’s Word has often descended to just an intellectual study. That
profits a little — like bodily exercise; but God has a better exercise than that for
us. God wants a spiritual exercise, not simply a mental one. He wants that Word
to go deeper than our intellect. God wants us to have faculties so exercised that
we will assimilate all the virtues and properties of that Word, that it may be
assimilated and become a part and parcel of our souls, that we may be built up in
this most holy faith and attain unto the full stature of Christ.
The element with which the Word must be mixed is faith. The carnal mind,
the unchanged heart, cannot receive the things of God, because they are
spiritually discerned. You and I will have a new faculty imparted to us when we
are born again, the Spirit of the living God planted within our heart; and with it
comes faith. It is not of ourselves, it is the gift of God; so it comes from above. All
we need to do is to conform to the regulations which God has stipulated, and
God will do the rest. He will see to it that that which is needed will be supplied.
The Christian has, as it were, a sort of sixth sense imparted to him. We
can discern the things of this world through our natural senses, our eyesight,
hearing, taste, sense of smell, sense of touch; but when it comes to the things of
God, we are venturing into the realm where our five senses are not sufficient.
They will not operate. It is true that you and I through our sight read that Word of
God, and to that extent one of our senses can lay hold of it; but there is
something beneath those printed words on India paper that we need to get hold
of. And for that it will require this sixth sense which the Lord imparts to us.
Applying the Word
It is marvelous how He fits us for comprehending the Word that we might
digest it, that it might become bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. That was
what Jesus meant when He said, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the
flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you” (John 6:53).
A little later He explained it more fully by saying, “The flesh profiteth nothing: the
words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63).
This truth was pre-figured in the Old Testament in the slain lamb. The
Israelites were to eat the whole lamb; the lamb had to be digested in order to be
bone of their bone and flesh of their flesh. That Lamb is the Word of God. It
becomes bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. The extent to which we are
going to profit by the Word will be measured by our faith.

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 Another peculiar thing is this: “Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by
the word of God” (Romans 10:17). Just as the digestive fluids are all supplied by
the food that is taken into the system, and those fluids used for the digesting of
the rest of the food that we take, so is the Word of God taken into us and
becomes that faith within us that enables us to digest this Word. The two work
together. The more we receive of the Word of God the more faith we have; the
more faith we have the more we are able to digest that Word and receive it into
our being.
The Children of Israel failed in the wilderness because they were not in a
position to receive the Word of God. They would have been if they had obeyed
the Word of God as they had promised to do at Mount Sinai, The very thing that
God wanted to do for them that would have put them into a position to receive
His Word, to keep His commandments and walk according to His precepts, they
refused. You can see the results of the whole thing.
You can see the warning that this writer is beginning to develop for the
Hebrew Christians. He felt they were in imminent danger of drawing back and
apostatizing from God. It is a terrible thing even to contemplate that. It is possible
so to turn back from the living God that one is past remedy. It is one of the truths
that is taught in God’s Word.
“For we which have believed do enter into rest, as he
said, As I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into my
rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of
the world”(Hebrews 4:3).
You notice that word “enter” is in the present. We begin an entry into our
rest just as soon as the change is wrought; the peace we experience is a
foretaste or earnest of our inheritance. So we are constantly entering into that
rest, but it will never be realized in its fullness until that day when the Lord comes
to receive His own.
Salvation begins with justification by faith, an instantaneous work, but
there is also a progressive work increasing and ever enlarging and expanding
until we come into the perfect realization which God intended us to have.
The Sabbaths
“For he spake in a certain place of the seventh day on
this wise, And God did rest the seventh day from all his
works” (Hebrews 4:4).
Now He is going back to the first type that we have of this rest, the rest
that God took after He completed the work of creation. Upon that type was built
all the sabbaths of the entire Israelitish religious program which God gave them.
They had the weekly sabbaths, also the sabbath of weeks that was later called
Pentecost. Every seventh month was the Feast of Tabernacles. Every seventh
year was a year of rest in which the land was to lie idle and in which there was an
adjustment of debts. During that year any bound servant could go free out of his
master’s house if he chose. Every 50th year was a year of Jubilee. All this

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sabbath system was established upon the first type which was given in Genesis
at the time of creation; and because of that we have a right to draw the
conclusion that there is also a millennial Sabbath.
With God a thousand years is as a day, as is stated in the Scriptures. We
are now living in the latter part of the sixth millennial day, about six thousand
years. This is one of the reasons why we believe we are very near that great
millennial Sabbath which is to be ushered in upon this world. See what a typical
significance that rest had back there. It was all typical of the rest that is provided
for the children of God.
“And in this place again, If they shall enter into my rest.
“Seeing therefore it remaineth that some must enter there
in, . . .” (Hebrews 4:5, 6).
That does not mean that they are compelled to enter in; it means there is
a rest remaining into which they may enter.
“. . . and they to whom it was first preached entered not
in because of unbelief” (Hebrews 4:6).
Even if they had entered into Canaan it would have been only a type.
Therefore the promise still remains to God’s people of a greater rest.
“Again, he limiteth a certain day, saying in David, . . .”
(Hebrews 4:7).
About five centuries elapsed from the time that they were going to enter
into Canaan up to the time that David wrote this Psalm.
“To day, after so long a time; as it is said, To day if ye
will hear his voice, harden not your hearts” (Hebrews 4:7).
Therefore we get an explanation of the hardening of hearts, too.
Pharaoh’s heart was hardened not because of any decree of the Lord, but
because he hardened it himself and the Lord permitted him to do so. Here we
have the exhortation: “Harden not your hearts.” That is what thousands upon
thousands are doing today — hardening their hearts against the Word of God.
They sit nightly in Gospel meetings and harden their hearts against the Word that
goes forth. The inevitable result is the same end that befell those whose
carcasses fell in the wilderness.
“To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
“For if Jesus [That means Joshua — Jesus is the Greek
rendition of the word Joshua.] had given them rest, then would
he not afterward have spoken of another day”
(Hebrews 4:7, 8).
That is, the Lord would have spoken of another day through David,
through this inspired Psalm.

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 “There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God”
(Hebrews 4:9).
It is significant that the word “rest” here is an entirely different word from
what he has been using for rest all the way through. The rest which he mentions
to be had in Canaan is such a rest as perhaps one would undergo when he
retired from his labors. But this word means a sabbath. He has introduced here
the first type, the sabbath which God established in the beginning. Now he
speaks of the sabbath rest because this is a grander and higher and greater rest
than anything they experienced in entering into Canaan. This is the eternal rest,
a rest for the people of God.
“For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased
from his own works, as God did from his” (Hebrews 4:10).
God rested from His labors of the old creation. The thought is that Jesus,
the forerunner of our faith, also rested from His labors in the new creation. Paul
says, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature,” or a “new
creation,” as we might translate it; and he rests from his own works to do the will
of God.
We are living in the new creation, not in the old. It is another way of
comparing the Old Dispensation with the New; and Christ is the Creator of the
new order. He entered into His rest when He arose from the grave on the first
day of the week. There we have an argument for the Christian observance of the
first day of the week as the Sabbath. Under the new creation under which you
and I are now living, Christ, having finished His labors, finished His mission. What
were the last words upon Calvary’s Cross? “It is finished.”
“Let us labor therefore to enter into that rest, lest any
man fall after the same example of unbelief.
“For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and
sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the
dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and
marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the
heart” (Hebrews 4:11, 12).
I do not know where in Scripture we have a more vital and vivid
description of the Word of God as we have in those words: “The word of God is
quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword.” You can see the
necessity for properly hearing the Word. If we do it, it is going to do the work
within us.
“Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his
sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of
him with whom we have to do” (Hebrews 4:13).
In other words, everyone will stand before Him some day in the judgment
and there will be nothing that will be hidden or covered up; it will all be laid bare.

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We will be judged at that time by that Word which is quick and powerful and
sharper than any two-edged sword. Jesus said Himself,
“I came not to judge the world, but to save the world”
(John12: 47).
“. . . the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and
they are life” (John 6:63).
We can take our choice of hearing that Word now and being judged by it
and having it search us out, or of standing in that last day and being condemned
by it then. That is the thought which he brings out in the closing of this
exhortation.

Jesus Christ, Prophet,

Priest and King
----Lesson Seven----

“Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is

passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold
fast our profession” (Hebrews 4:14).
We return to the subject which is announced in the first verse of the third
chapter: “Consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus.”
The separate offices of prophet, priest, and king that were held under the Old
Testament dispensation are merged into one in the Person of Jesus Christ in the
New Dispensation. These offices were entirely separate under the Old Covenant.
The prophet never held the office of king, although some kings, like David, had
prophetic ability. A number of the Psalms which David wrote were prophetic in
character, but David was, in his official position, a king.
The priests and prophets were entirely separate in their official capacity. In
nearly all instances, the prophets held a place above the kings. They did not
hesitate to rebuke kings, and to carry God’s message to them when they
offended. We shall find as we proceed in this Epistle that these offices were
consolidated in Jesus Christ as Prophet, Priest, and King.
Christ Fulfills the Law
The Old Dispensation thus finds its perfect fulfillment in the Person and
office of Jesus. The entire Old Testament points to one figure, and that is the
Lord Jesus. When He said that He came not to destroy the Law but to fulfill it, it
had far greater reach than His present fulfillment of it. It was true that He did fulfill
it personally. He kept the Law. He also fulfilled it in a legal capacity, and in an
official sense. So in every possible way, He was a perfect fulfillment of the Law

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and the prophets. They were all gathered up in Him and carried out in Him; and
to Him pointed all the Law and the prophets of the Old Testament.
Christ also has been shown to be superior to the angels in the heavenly
realm. That was shown in the opening of the Epistle. Then He was shown to be
superior to Moses as prophet here upon earth. And now the author, Paul,
proceeds to say that He is superior to Aaron in His priestly office, standing above
all priests. The priestly office in the patriarchal period was fulfilled by the patriarch
fathers, heads of families, heads of tribes, as in the case of Noah. Noah offered
sacrifice unto the Lord; Abraham did; and also Job. Each acted as a priest over
his own house. The Word states that Job arose early to sacrifice for his sons
continually, lest they had sinned against the Lord.
The Aaronic Priesthood
When it came to the giving of the Law and establishing the elaborate
Tabernacle service, a change took place. In the period of the Law there came a
marked change in the dispensations of God. God established a regular
priesthood and made Aaron the head of it. It was to be a perpetual priesthood
throughout their generations, maintained by Aaron’s descendants.
“And take thou unto thee Aaron thy brother, and his
sons with him, from among the children of Israel, that he may
minister unto me in the priest’s office, even Aaron, Nadab and
Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar, Aaron’s sons” (Exodus 28:1).
“And thou shalt bring Aaron and his sons unto the door
of the tabernacle of the congregation, and wash them with
water.
“And thou shalt put upon Aaron the holy garments, and
anoint him, and sanctify him; that he may minister unto me in
the priest’s office.
“And thou shalt bring his sons, and clothe them with
coats:
“And thou shalt anoint them, as thou didst anoint their
father, that they may minister unto me in the priest’s office: for
their anointing shall surely be an everlasting priesthood
through out their generations” (Exodus 40:12-15).
There were three offices under the Law that were anointed, that of
prophet, priest, and king. Their Messiah was known as the “anointed one.” So
while these prophets, priests, and kings were anointed for their separate office,
Christ was anointed for the fulfillment of all of them.
The duties of the priest in connection with the Tabernacle service were
mainly the offering of sacrifices. Individual Israelites could not approach God
except through the priesthood. Therefore the priest stood as mediator between
Israel and God. When the Israelites came with their sacrifices, the offerings were
delivered into the hands of the officiating priest. He, according to the provisions

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laid down in the Law, slaughtered the sacrifice, sprinkled the blood upon the
altar, and placed the sacrifice upon the altar where it was consumed. And when
they brought their gifts unto the Lord, such as the wave offering, the meal
offering, and the meat offering — many of them are recorded in the Law — those
gifts were not presented by the Israelites, but by the priest himself. So in all
cases pertaining to God, the priest acted as intercessor and mediator between
Israel and God.
In Spirit and in Truth
“Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is
passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold
fast our profession” (Hebrews 4:14).
This verse is an answer to the objection to the worship of the Hebrew
Christians that the Jews were bringing. They in substance were telling the
Hebrew Christians: “You have no tabernacle; you have no temple; you have no
priest; you have no sacrifice; you have no altar; you have no ritual.” And that was
all true. From the Jewish standpoint they, therefore, had no religion because, by
their conception, religion was inseparably bound up with these outward
observances. They could not conceive of any one’s continuing in a religion and
dispensing with these things.
From their standpoint, you can see how difficult it would be for a Jewish
convert, even after his change of heart, to catch a glimpse of heavenly things and
adjust himself to the new order. The Christians’ answer is: “We have a great high
priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God.”
Jesus said to the woman at the well:
“Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when ye shall
neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the
Father.
“Ye worship ye know not what: we know what we
worship: for salvation is of the Jews.
“But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true
worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for
the Father seeketh such to worship him” (John 4:21-23).
Jesus struck the very keynote of what Paul declared to the Hebrew
Christians, namely, that true worship does not in anywise depend upon outward
symbols, outward appearance, ritualism, sacrifice or offering; but it consists of
one’s worshiping God in Spirit and in truth. That seems to be one of the hardest
lessons that humanity has to learn. Very few men and women seem to reach the
point, as Moses did, where they can endure as “seeing him who is invisible”
(Hebrews 11:27). Moses could by faith see Jesus, although he was the one who
was commissioned of the Lord to establish the Tabernacle service with its
ritualism and sacrifices.

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 Moses saw beyond the sacrifices. He saw the invisible God; and because
of that, he endured. In spite of all we have in Scripture along the line of
worshiping God in Spirit and in truth, people down through the ages have been
lapsing into the idea of having something tangible that they can see and feel, in
order to worship God. Even among Protestants, many have substituted church
organization, church forms, church ceremonies, and all the elaborate
paraphernalia that goes with it, for the true worship of the Father.
It means something for people to cleave to the pure essence of the
worship of God. It is possible to worship God in Spirit and in truth without any
paraphernalia. It is true that God has an outward church. It is necessary that
there be a physical church as long as congregations are made up of human
beings; and it is necessary that they have a board, that they have some officers.
But they are just outward trappings, not the essential things. The main thing in
the worship of God is, beyond all these things, that we see the invisible God and
worship Him in Spirit and in truth.
The Catholic Church today resorts to all manner of devices by which their
form of worship may be tangible and seen. They have their crucifixes, their
amulets, strings of beads, and images they bow before. That is simply lapsing
into the very thing that God was seeking to bring Israel out of.
The rearing of the Tabernacle with its rituals and forms was that Israel
might be taught through visible bodies to look beyond them to the true and the
living God, to see in those objects the shadow that pointed to the Reality. But
they failed to see it. They came to the point where their ritualism, their forms and
observances were the whole thing. It is true that those things were in the Law,
but the scribes and Pharisees had reached the point where they were straining at
a gnat and swallowing a camel. They paid tithes of cummin, mint, and anise, and
left out the weightier matters of the Law: faith, mercy, and justice. Jesus said,
“These ought ye to have done.” Small things are not to be omitted. There is
nothing inconsequential in the Word of God. It is all necessary. It is all to be
observed; but there are some things in there that are far more important than
others. Those are the things upon which you and I are to put stress and
emphasis.
The True Tabernacle
In John 1:14 we find written:
“And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us”
(John 1:14).
The real translation of that word “dwelt” is “tabernacled.” I verily believe
that that harks back to the Tabernacle; as the Tabernacle was pitched in the
wilderness, so Jesus came to the earth in fulfillment of all that it represented. The
Tabernacle was a temporary structure for use during their wanderings through
the wilderness. When they became established as a nation in the promised land,
the Temple was built, which became a permanent place of worship. “Tabernacle”
is used here because He just tabernacled among us for a brief time. The

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Tabernacle in the wilderness foreshadowed Him. Everything connected with the
Tabernacle pointed to Him.
“Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is
passed into the heavens, . . .” (Hebrews 4:14).
The thought here expressed is that He has passed into the heavens, into
the presence of God. The priest in his service went first to the brazen altar which
stood outside the Tabernacle, and there all sacrifices were made. Then he took
the blood of the sacrifice and passed through the first veil before the sanctuary
and performed his ceremonies. If he was a high priest, he went on through the
second veil into the Holiest of All. This seems to have been the thought of the
author here.
Likewise, when Jesus was upon the Mount of Olives, He was received up
into a cloud and carried into Heaven, through the physical heavens, out of the
sight of His disciples. He passed into the presence of God just as the priest
passed into the Holiest of All.
In another place in Hebrews, In speaking of Jesus, Paul says:
“A minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle,
which the Lord pitched, and not man” (Hebrews 8:2).
When Jesus entered into the presence of God, He entered into the true
Tabernacle. The Tabernacle which was pitched in the wilderness was a replica of
the true Tabernacle which is in Heaven. That is why the Lord enjoined Moses to
see that he did everything according to the pattern showed him in the Mount. The
Tabernacle on earth was only a shadow of the true Tabernacle that exists in
Heaven.
God’s plan of redemption appears as a sacred dream unfolding to our
view. Some scenes are set in Heaven and others are set on earth. Just as the
priest went before the brazen altar that was outside the Tabernacle, offering
sacrifices and performing his service, and then went in before the Lord, so Jesus
Christ came to this earth (outside the true Tabernacle), went as a sacrifice to
Calvary’s cross, and then ascended through the heavens into the presence of
God. How beautifully the Old Testament type has been carried out in His mission
to this earth!
The Failure of the Aaronic Priesthood
“For we have not an high priest which cannot be
touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points
tempted like as we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15).
It is implied here that the Aaronic priests could not be touched with the
feeling of our infirmities. They became steeped in ceremonialism and finally
debased to the point where they simply exploited the people instead of helping
them. The Lord had appointed the Aaronic priesthood to be a mediator, a helper,
to bring the people to God; but instead of that, the priests descended to the point
where they exploited the people for their own profit. At as early a date as Eli’s

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time, his sons did that very thing, and became covetous. They profited illegally by
the offerings that the people brought, till the whole thing became a stench in the
nostrils of God. He set aside the whole line of Eli, and brought in another
member of the family of Aaron to fulfill the office of priest. All the way through,
this priesthood fell short of that to which God had called them. And now Paul is
bringing out by implication that very difference:
“Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace,
that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of
need” (Hebrews 4:16).
That Throne of Grace has reference to the Mercy Seat where the very
presence of God dwelt. Under the Old Dispensation the high priest went into that
place, the Holy of Holies, once a year, and that not without blood — the blood of
the sacrifice. And there every move he made, every step he took, had to be in
strict accordance with the Law that God had laid down. A breach of the Law
meant death. Therefore he wore bells upon his garments, that as he moved
about in his service, the Israelites would hear and know that he was still in the
service of the Lord.
God’s Grace and Mercy
That is how strict God’s Law was. But now that we have a High Priest who
has entered into the true Tabernacle, to the true Holy Place, Paul brings out the
contrast as to how we may enter boldly, without fear, and obtain mercy and find
grace to help in time of need. Grace is defined as God’s favor shown to the
undeserving, those who merit nothing. That is the case with every one of us. But
mercy goes a step farther than that. Mercy is God’s favor shown to the ill-
deserving, those who merited punishment, as in the case of the sinner. You can
see what wonderful reaches these two words have: God’s grace and God’s
mercy. No matter what place we occupy in God’s service, how busy we may be,
what good we may be doing, what visits we may be making; no matter how
diligent we may be in giving our testimony, in visiting the sick, in going to the jails
and the hospitals, there is not one thing that we do that merits God’s favor. It is
well for us to remember that. The sacrifice that Jesus made, and that alone,
merits His favor.
“Could my tears forever flow,
Could my zeal no languor know,
These for sin could not atone,
Thou must save, and Thou alone.”
And that is as true after we are saved as before. We are saved from day
to day, from hour to hour, from moment to moment, by the merits of the crucified
One. Where is there any room for boasting? We are rewarded for our works, but
we are never saved by them. That is another point in which Christendom has
fallen down — if they do not do it doctrinally, they do it unconsciously or
subconsciously, depending upon the things they are doing to find favor in the

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sight of God. There will be many disappointed people some day. They will find
that their work has never won the favor of God. They will also find another thing:
that their works are bringing no reward if done in that attitude.
“For every high priest taken from among men is
ordained for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer
both gifts and sacrifices for sins” (Hebrews 5:1).
In Old Testament times it had descended to meaning only offerings and
sacrifices, with no spiritual significance. They were like the people Jesus spoke of
when He said: “This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and
honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me” (Matthew 15:8).
“Who can have compassion on the ignorant, . . .”
(Hebrews 5:2).
That means those who are ignorant of God. The word “agnostic” comes from the
same word. An agnostic is one who says, “I cannot know.” The infidel is one who
says, “I cannot believe.” An atheist is one who says, “There is no God.”
“. . . and on them that are out of the way: . . .”
Or “on them who wander.” That reminds us of the fifty-third of Isaiah:
“All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way”
(Isaiah 53:6).
“. . . for that he himself also is compassed with infirmity.
“And by reason hereof he ought, as for the people, so
also for himself, to offer for sins” (Hebrews 5:2, 3).
He is defining what the priest in the Old Testament dispensation should
be. He offered sacrifice for the sins of the people, but he also had to offer
sacrifice for his own sins. What is implied here is that our High Priest never had
to do that, for He was without sin.
“And no man taketh this honour unto himself, but he
that is called of God, as was Aaron” (Hebrews 5:4).
Though the priests are appointed to represent man, yet God does the
appointing. In fact, there is no office in the church from the least to the greatest
but that God does the appointing. And more than that, when He does the
appointing, the congregation will recognize that He has put that man or that
woman in his particular place. That does not apply only to the officials but it
applies to every one who has a part in the service of God. If you recognize that
fact when you have been given a task to do, that the Lord through His ministry or
overseer has assigned it to you, it ought to put upon your heart a greater
responsibility in taking care of it. You have received your commission, whatever it
may be — washing cars, taking care of the place of worship, or some humble
task — from the Lord. You are accountable to the Lord for the way you do that
job. That was the case with the priesthood.

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 This fourth verse is frequently argued by some for the continuation of the
priesthood. As comment on the further argument that he brings out, I want to
read here what a devout man has to say about that:
“Some make this statement an argument for the uninterrupted succession
of popes and their bishops in the church, who alone have the authority to ordain
for the sacerdotal office; and whosoever is otherwise appointed, is with them
illegitimate. [That we find to be the case not only in the Catholic church but in
some forms of Protestant denominations.] It is idle to employ time in proving that
there is no such thing as an uninterrupted succession of this kind: it does not
exist; it never did exist; it is a silly fable, invented by ecclesiastical tyrants, and
supported by clerical coxcombs.”
In the time of Jesus the priesthood had sunk to nothing but a political
preference, and not through the line of Aaron. They were taken from any source
that suited those who appointed them. So the succession was broken long before
the New Testament period began.
So it is not hard to guess what Jesus’ attitude is toward the present-day
priesthood. The Pope is appointed as the vicar of Christ, one to reign in the place
of another. The vicar or vice regent has on his crown “Vicarius Filii Dei.” That
means vice regent of the Son of God.
If Christ is priest forever, as is set forth in this sixth verse (where he
quotes Psalm 110), there can be no succession of priests. He has abrogated that
in becoming a Priest, not after a carnal kingdom, but after the power of an
endless life; so there is no more succession of priests.
If He has all power in Heaven and in earth, and if He is present wherever
two or three are gathered together in His name (that is His promise), He can
have no vicars; nor does the Church need one to act in His place. He is there in
person. When true Children of God meet to worship Him, Jesus Christ, the Great
High Priest, is there in Spirit. We feel His stately steppings among us.
Therefore, the Pope becomes convicted by the Word of God as an
impostor. And the whole Catholic system becomes a figment based upon no
Scriptural ground whatever. The priesthood of the Catholic Church has
maintained itself in diametrical opposition to the express declaration of the Word
of God.
Christ’s Eternal Priesthood
“So also Christ glorified not himself to be made an high priest; but
he that said unto him, Thou art my Son, to day have I begotten thee.
“As he saith also in another place, Thou art a priest for ever after the
order of Melchisedec” (Hebrews 5:5, 6).
Melchisedec is mentioned in the Old Testament, at the time Abraham
came back from the slaughter of the kings, bringing the spoils. Melchisedec
came out to meet him and brought offerings — no doubt food for his exhausted
men and for the servants whom he had with him. It is stated that Melchisedec

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was king of Salem; and Salem has been identified unquestionably as being
Jerusalem. Salem means peace; and Jerusalem, the city of peace. (They both
contain the same root, Salem.) When Melchisedec came out there, he blessed
Abraham. It states that he was a priest of the Most High God; and Abraham paid
him tithes of his spoils. He gave them to Melchisedec. (Bear this in mind because
a little later Paul is going to take the matter up in detail.)
Melchisedec is a man of mysterious character. His genealogy is unknown.
He is first mentioned in Genesis 14; and all other references are to this mention
of him. He appears in the pages and silently disappears. He occupies,
nevertheless, a great place in Scripture because he became a type of Christ’s
eternal Priesthood that took the place of the Aaronic priesthood of old.

The Atonement
“Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and
supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save
him from death, and was heard in that he feared” (Hebrews 5:7).
This has reference to what Christ had to face in going to the Cross. He not
only was facing that In the Garden of Gethsemane when He prayed alone, but I
believe He faced it many other times throughout His ministry— perhaps in some
of those nights out upon the bleak mountainside where He sought the Father and
prayed.
Men fear death because of what they have to meet after death: the
judgment. But that was not the fear of Christ. He shrank from what He would
have to bear upon the Cross. It was not the stripes that were laid upon His back
from which He shrank, nor the crown of thorns pressed upon His brow; nor was it
the nails that pierced His hands and feet, nor the mockings and the scoffs that
were heaped upon Him. The thing from which He shrank was brought out in that
agonizing cry, quoted through one of the Psalms: “My God, my God, why hast
thou forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46).
Jesus faced something there On the Cross that the human mind has
never fathomed. Upon Him came the entire load of sin of a lost world. Upon the
Cross He was to make propitiation for every sin; and the burden came upon Him.
Right then the Father’s face was averted, because He could not tolerate sin in
the least degree. That is what brought forth this cry; and it was that from which
Jesus seemed to shrink.
Jesus was in constant communion with the Father, and He said that He
and the Father were one. Here the Father’s face was averted and His presence
withdrawn until that propitiation was completed, the Atonement made, and Christ
had seen His mission through to the end. Then He cried, “It is finished!”
“But none of the ransomed ever knew
How deep were the waters crossed;

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 Nor how dark was the night that the
Lord passed through
Ere He found His sheep that was lost.”
“And being made perfect, he became the author of
eternal salvation unto all them that obey him” (Hebrews 5:9).
That means that He had perfected His mission. He personally needed no
perfecting — He was perfect in His incarnation from Bethlehem to the Cross. He
finished His mission — completed it there — and thus became the Author of
eternal salvation unto all them that believe Him and obey Him. In fact, believing
and obeying are almost synonymous terms in Scripture. Therefore when a man
says that he believes in Christ and does not do what Christ commands he is not
making the kind of sacrifice that the Bible is talking about. Only those who obey
Him are entitled to eternal life.
“Called of God an high priest after the order of
Melchisedec” (Hebrews 5:10).
This was a new order that was being created.
Hearing the Word
“Of whom we have many things to say, and hard to be
uttered, seeing ye are dull of hearing” (Hebrews 5:11).
Have you noticed how much stress the writer puts upon the matter of
hearing the Word? What was it that had dulled the hearing of these Hebrew
Christians? They had allowed unbelief and discouragement to come in. There are
many things that can dull our hearing. One thing is our being preoccupied with
temporal affairs, our own interests. Another thing that dulls our hearing is the
pleasure of this world. We of this faith do not object to legitimate pleasure,
recreation, relaxation. Jesus occasionally retired and went across to the other
side of the sea with His disciples to rest. But whenever pleasure begins to
occupy a place in our lives that is detrimental to our spiritual life, it has gone too
far. That thing will dull our spiritual hearing and senses.
If our spiritual hearing becomes dulled, we have not the keen quality of
discernment that God wants. Jesus complained to His disciples of that thing. He
occasionally gave a parable and said, “Are ye also without understanding?” He
did not marvel that those on the outside were without understanding, but He
expected the disciples to understand the mystery of the Kingdom. And when He
gave a parable He expected them to catch its spiritual significance.
If the Spirit of God in the heart and life is active, and we are right up to the
“chalk mark” in our experience, and keep our intellectual faculties and our
discernment alert to catch the things of the Spirit, we will not let the Word of God
slip. Because of persecution, the Hebrew Christians were in danger of letting the
Word slip. Discouragement had overtaken them.

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 May our prayer be: Give us eyes to see and ears to hear! The
condemnation put upon the Israelites of old was that they had eyes but that they
saw not, and ears to hear but they heard not. They had become spiritually blind.
Notice men like Peter. All he had to see was a draught of fishes miraculously
caught after he toiled all night unsuccessfully, to fall at Jesus’ feet and cry out,
“Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” Peter recognized immediately
that He was the Christ.
Nathanael, whom Philip brought to Jesus, stood under the fig tree. All that
Jesus had to say to him was, “I saw thee under the fig tree,” and immediately
Nathanael answered, “Thou art the Son of God”; and worshiped Him. On the
other hand, there were the scribes and Pharisees, the learned men who had the
Law of God before them and who were versed in it. They considered themselves
the true seed of Abraham, and others as sinners and outcasts. They saw miracle
after miracle; they saw healing after healing. They sat in the synagogues; they
saw the paralytic rise from that pallet and take up his bed and walk; they saw that
man who was born blind come into their midst and testify to what had happened.
They witnessed the miracles; yet through it all they failed to see that He was the
Son of God.
They had eyes to see and they saw not — spiritual stupidity. They were
twice dead, and plucked up by the roots. That is the condition that can come
upon one who has sat under the light and hearing of God’s Word and failed to
abide by it.
Spiritual Strength
“For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have
need that one teach you again which be the first principles of
the oracles of God; and are become such as have need of milk,
and not of strong meat” (Hebrews 5:12).
Here he is referring to the similarity between the body and the soul, and it
is wonderful how they parallel all the way through. Just as the body is fed by
food, is increased in stature and given strength, so the soul grows, increases and
flourishes in proportion as it is fed. The meat on which the soul feeds is the Word
of God. Job said, “I have esteemed the words of his mouth more than my
necessary food” (Job 23:12). Job would rather go hungry — miss a meal — than
miss the Word of God. Isaiah said, “And let your soul delight itself in fatness”
(Isaiah 55:2). This means feasting on the things of God.
“For every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of
righteousness: for he is a babe.
“But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age,
even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised
to discern both good and evil” (Hebrews 5:13, 14).
And the soul seems to have the five senses, just as the body has. You
know how the touch can be exercised until it becomes exceedingly delicate. The

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same Is true of our other senses — hearing, seeing, tasting— all are made
delicate in proportion to how they are used.
It is the same way with the senses of the soul. If one is walking softly
before the Lord and continues that way, making it his daily practice, he will get to
the point where he will discern the leading of the Spirit right along. The
promptings of the Spirit will become his daily guide. On the other hand, one who
is careless in his walk and does not mind the promptings of the Spirit, but
overrides them, will soon reach the point where he will no longer feel or discern
the leading of the Spirit. That is what is meant by so using and exercising the
senses that they will discern both good and evil.
In another place in Hebrews we read:
“Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be
joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the
peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are
exercised thereby” (Hebrews 12:11).
And the emphasis comes on that last clause: “unto them which are
exercised thereby.” This implies that if a man is not exercised by the chastening
through which he passes, it does him no good. If he goes down under it, and fails
in it, he will have to be brought up to the very same place again until he gets to
the point where he is exercised by it. That means being able to go through the
chastening or disciplining through which God is trying to put him, and his being
able to stand the thing and come through with the benefit that God intended it to
bring him. Then he is being exercised by it; and he is repaid a hundredfold for
having stood it and gone through it, whatever the pain or torture might have been
while he was in it.
The difference between a babe and the man or woman of full stature is
brought out here. But he implies that these Hebrew Christians were in danger of
remaining babes. Their growth might become stunted. Whereas they ought by
this time to have been on strong meat, they were only able, as infants, to take
milk.
It does not take much to make an infant cry. A little thing can upset him;
and what is true of an infant in a physical sense is also true of “infants” in a
spiritual sense. Some people are very easily upset. Any little thing can offend
them. They are just infants. The Lord helps us to get to the point where we can
take strong meat, where the Lord can send things that could at some previous
time have downed us! Now we can go through victoriously and be enabled to
stand. If that is the case, we are reaching the place where we can take strong
meat.
Jesus said, “And blessed is he, whosoever shall not be offended in me”
(Matthew 11:6). What the Lord is seeking is that we shall attain unto full stature,
that we shall so absorb the Word that we shall grow. If one hears that Word and
fails to heed it, he will remain an Infant — and perhaps worse than that.

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 What is meant by being exercised by the Word? When we hear it, there is
something in our heart that purposes to do it, to apply It. The school in which God
trains His children is something more than an intellectual school. It means more
than just sitting under the hearing of the Word and pondering it. It means
applying it constantly to our own hearts and lives: that we hear it and go down
before the Lord in prayer and ask God to lay it as a template on our hearts. The
Word of God is a template to be laid upon our lives, to see that we measure up to
that which God intends we should; to apply that Word constantly to our hearts
and strive to measure unto it.
The Hebrew Christians had not gone beyond the first principles. In chapter
6, in the 1st and 2nd verses, we get an idea what these principles are:
“Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of
Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the
foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward
God” (Hebrews 6:1).
We should not be constantly going back to lay the foundation; but having
laid it, and having set our stake, we should go on unto perfection.

Fighting the Fight of Faith

----Lesson Eight----
We now take up the sixth chapter of Hebrews:
“Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of
Christ, . . .”
You who have the Oxford edition will notice that in the margin there is an
alternate reading given: “The Word of the beginning of Christ.” That seems to
mean the doctrine of Christ as revealed in the Law, the Tabernacle service, and
the prophets of the Old Testament. We must bear in mind that the writer here is,
from the beginning to the end, contrasting the New with the Old.
The exhortation given is: leave the Law and come to the Gospel; cease
from Moses and come to the Messiah. The doctrines are enumerated:
repentance, faith, the doctrine of baptism, laying on of hands, resurrection of the
dead, and eternal judgment. We shall find them all taught in a rudimentary way in
the Old Testament.
For example, repentance: one of the most familiar verses we have is, “Let
the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him
return unto the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he
will abundantly pardon” (Isaiah 55:7). Also in the 51st Psalm: “A broken and a
contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise” (Psalm 51:17).

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 Faith toward God is brought out in the life of Abraham, who believed God
and it was counted unto him for righteousness. Water baptism was typified in the
laver that was set before the Tabernacle:
“Thou shalt also make a laver of brass, and his foot also
of brass, to wash withal: and thou shalt put it between the
tabernacle of the congregation and the altar, and thou shalt
put water therein” (Exodus 30:18).
The doctrine of the resurrection of the dead is also stated in the Old
Testament: “Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they
arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs,
and the earth shall cast out the dead” (Isaiah 26:19). The resurrection of the
dead is clearly and beautifully taught in that verse.
About eternal judgment, we read in Daniel:
“I beheld till the thrones were cast down, and the
Ancient of days did sit, whose garment was white as snow,
and the hair of his head like the pure wool: his throne was like
the fiery flame, and his wheels as burning fire.
“A fiery stream issued and came forth from before him:
thousand thousands ministered unto him, and ten thousand
times ten thousand stood before him: the judgment was set,
and the books were opened” (Daniel 7:9, 10).
So all these doctrines are taught in the Old Testament, but not in the
fullness with which they are expounded and set forth in the New Testament.
Spiritual Growth
Paul calls these Old Testament teachings the elements of the world. He
states that they were foreshadowed by a worldly Tabernacle, and by the shadow
of material things. He calls them “rudiments.” He exhorted the Galatians, to
whom he was writing, not to turn back to the beggarly elements of the world.
They had fulfilled their mission, and their time was past. Why continue in the
primary grades when we have graduated to a higher school of learning? Our
spiritual development will not exceed at any time what we have received in the
way of instruction in the Word of God. That is how essential it is to receive the
teachings of the Word, and to have ears that hear, and eyes that see, that we
may go on unto perfection.
If our spiritual development is going to be measured by the extent to which
we receive that Word — and it is — we see how essential it is that the instruction
be received if we are to attain unto perfection. That was the object Paul had in
writing to the Hebrew Christians.
“. . . not laying again the foundation of repentance from
dead works, . . .”

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 The attentiveness with which we hear God’s Word and include it within our
spiritual being has everything to do with our ability to withstand the onslaughts of
the enemy, to stand against the powers of darkness that are coming against us.
If it does not have that effect upon us we have lost the kernel of the whole thing.
What is going to make us any different after ten years in the Gospel from what
we were when we were first converted? It is the strengthening and the building
up that the Word of God gives.
If you and I are better enabled to resist the onslaughts of the enemy today
than we were ten years ago; if we can withstand the assaults which at that time
would have bowled us over and put us down, it is because that Word has been
incorporated into our being and has built us up in faith. That is why it is essential
to lay hold of it; not only to receive it with these physical ears, but to receive it
down into our very heart. That is where it is going to do the work.
The Hebrew Christians were so lacking in instruction that they were
undernourished and undeveloped — babes without spiritual strength. This first
verse indicates that they were constantly falling and having to repent from dead
works. “Dead works” here means continuing the motions of Christianity long after
the Spirit has taken His flight. There is plenty of that kind of Christianity in the
world today. They found that they had to repent and go down before the Lord
because they had not moved into the larger sphere that the Lord had for them.
They were still in the primary grades, going through their A B C’s. The Lord
wants us to go beyond this into the deeper depths.
Backsliding
We read from the 4th to the 8th verse another one of those stern warnings
set forth in the Word of God. This is a very important one. This is a passage of
Scripture that has caused much perplexity and misgivings among believers,
especially among those who have backslidden, lost the grace of God out of their
heart.
This Epistle resounds again and again with warnings against the danger of
turning away from God — the danger of letting our zeal or faith slacken in any
degree, and thus laying us liable to drift into the state that is herein described.
The Bible has no brief for backsliders; there is no premium offered for the
man who fails God. We certainly have all the needful help, all the
encouragement, all the admonition and the instruction in the Scripture to enable
us to make the goal without ever failing God, if we sufficiently heed His Word.
Our weakness is often due to our failing to lay hold of God’s power, and
neglecting prayer and the study of the Word: therefore we are not built up to the
point where we can stand the assaults.
We are certainly facing a period of Christianity where we shall need to
have the strength that God has for each one of us. We do not know what is going
to confront us in the crisis that is coming upon the world. There is only one thing
that we can look to and one thing that we can hope for in these days, and that is
God’s grace which He manifested in His inspired Word and offered to us. If our

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study of this Word will help us and strengthen us in this regard, I believe we have
accomplished God’s purpose. It is possible for a child of God to go straight
through and maintain the victory without backsliding. It has been proved many
times.
There is a great difference between ordinary backsliding and what is set
forth in these verses. The Bible draws a distinction between backsliding and
falling away from God. For the backslider there is every hope of his restoration, if
he will repent and renew his vows to the Lord. There are too many exhortations
and entreaties in the Scriptures directed to backsliders to admit any other belief.
I have heard some people say that if you have had the baptism of the Holy
Ghost and failed, there is no more hope for you. You do not find any such thing in
the Word of God; and it has been disproved time and time again by those who
have thus failed. But because God extends His mercy and grace to those who do
backslide, do not let us draw the conclusion that that is a reason for letting down
the standards or becoming less zealous in our walk before the Lord. We should
maintain the standards the same as though there were no way of getting back to
the Lord.
The Unpardonable Sin
But for the man who has fallen away from God and has reached the final
stage that is depicted in these verses, there is no hope. John said, “There is a sin
unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it” (I John 5:16). Jesus alluded to
the same thing when He spoke of the unpardonable sin. To fall away from God
means to apostatize, to deny the faith, to reject the very means of faith and the
only means by which we have access to God.
Were a patient afflicted with a fatal disease for which only one known
remedy existed, and he scornfully refused to take that remedy and rejected it, his
inevitable and just doom would be death. An apostate is a man who once has
known the efficacy of God’s saving grace (the only remedy for the disease of sin)
and then has scornfully denounced and rejected this remedy which alone can
save him from perdition. He has put himself into the same category with those
who crucified Christ; he has crucified Him afresh and put Him to an open shame.
He is in the same class as those who stood about the Cross and mocked Him
and looked on Him as an impostor. He has put himself out of utilizing the very
means by which he has access to God. He is absolutely cut off from God by the
position he has taken. His doom is just.
We are taught in these words a solemn truth. It is awful to contemplate
that a man, after having attained a high state of grace, after having tasted of the
heavenly gifts and having been made a partaker of the Holy Ghost (and I
construe that in no other way than that he has received the baptism of the Holy
Ghost), having tasted the good Word of God and the power of the world to come,
could so fall away as to render his case hopeless. He is like the ground spoken
of in Christ’s parable of the Sower and the Seed.

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 “But that which beareth thorns and briers is rejected,
and is nigh unto cursing; whose end is to be burned”
(Hebrews 6:8).
But this dreadful state is not reached in a moment nor in a single leap.
While we are on this matter of apostasy, as set forth in the Word of God, it would
be a good thing to review the life of King Saul. He was probably one of the most
tragic failures chronicled in the Bible. But he did not reach that state in one or two
steps. There were a great many false steps which led him into that condition.
When he returned from the battle with the Arnalekites, having failed to
fulfill the command of God, Samuel, in rebuking him, said, “When thou wast little
in thine own sight” (I Samuel 15:17). That would imply that pride had come in.
There was a time when Saul walked softly before the Lord, in humility. At the
time that he was to be anointed king, he could not be found. Presently he was
found hidden among the stuff, which indicated a meekness of spirit. But after he
had won several victories, he apparently took the glory unto himself instead of
giving God the glory. One has thrown the doors open to pride as soon as he
does that. God said, “I am the LORD: that is my name: and my glory will I not
give to another, neither my praise to graven images” (Isaiah 42:8).
Saul’s next step was disobedience: “Wherefore then didst thou not obey
the voice of the LORD?” (I Samuel 15:19). Having taken things into his own
hands, it was easy for him to go a step farther and disobey the command that
was given him. The next step down we find to be self-justification: “I have obeyed
the voice of the LORD” (I Samuel 15:20).
When one has done wrong, and has started upon that course, he will
justify himself in his wrongs, which is another step in the downward way.
Presently we find the trait of anger manifesting itself in Saul’s life: This was when
great throngs went out to greet David, and they sang in chorus: “Saul hath slain
his thousands, and David his ten thousands” (I Samuel 18:7). And Saul was very
wroth. Next we find covetousness exhibited: “What can he have more but the
kingdom?” (v. 8). He was holding on to the kingdom with a death grip. He was
not going to let it go or let any man take it from him. It is well to hold some things
tightly and to cleave to them, but not the things of this world — especially when
the Lord has decreed that we shall be stripped of them.
Then we find envy manifested: “And Saul eyed David from that day and
forward” (I Samuel 18:9). Next we find hatred: “And Saul became David’s enemy
continually” (I Samuel 18:29).These are all quotations which give a panoramic
view of Saul’s downward course. The next is devil possession: “And the evil spirit
from the LORD was upon Saul” (I Samuel 19:9). Then murder: “And Saul sought
to smite David even to the wall with the javelin” (I Samuel 19:10). And the next
step is witchcraft: “I pray thee, divine unto me by the familiar spirit” (I Samuel
28:8).
We have in our verses in Hebrews a warning against turning away from
God. What is turning away from God except turning to some other system to take
the place of the plan which God has given us? That is a sure step on the

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downward course. There are many who have started in this Christian way who
have perhaps followed very much in Saul’s footsteps, who have come to the very
place that Saul did, and have turned to some other system — a system perhaps
that contained some truth, but rejected other parts of it, and introduced false
doctrine.
If one is going to reject any of the Word, he might as well reject it all. We
either will have to abide by it all, or reject it all. Many have thus gone step by step
to the point where they were ready to turn away from the Gospel standard, the
plan which God has laid out; and have turned to some other plan, and have thus
received a delusion.
That was the state to which Saul came. He could no longer hear from the
Lord, no longer receive any comfort or consolation. After having massacred the
priests and their families at Nob, he sought the advice of those who remained.
He called in the prophets for counsel after he had persecuted them. But he
received no reply from the Lord. There was a time when Saul had God’s counsel,
but he scorned it. Now he was in a position where he needed His counsel, and
he could no longer receive it.
Then came his final step: “Saul took a sword, and fell upon it” — suicide.
We have a good example in the life of Saul of a man who apostatized from the
Lord.
“Never Give Up”
From the 9th through the 12th verses is an exhortation which in substance
means not to give up the fight.
“But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you,
and things that accompany salvation, though we thus speak.
“For God is not unrighteous to forget your work and
labour of love, which ye have shewed toward his name, in that
ye have ministered to the saints, and do minister.
“And we desire that every one of you do shew the same
diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end:
“That ye be not slothful, but followers of them who
through faith and patience inherit the promises” (Hebrews 6:9-
12).
They had not reached a state of hopelessness, but Paul’s fear here was
that because of the persuasions and persecutions of the Judaizers they would be
so much discouraged that they would give up altogether and forsake the Lord. So
this is an exhortation to continue to fight and go on, to fight against evil no matter
how the odds may be against one. It is never a losing fight. Remember that!
It is better to die fighting than to give up the battle of right against wrong.
We have a national example in France in the collapse of that country in World
War II. It came as a surprise to a great many that the nation which seemed to

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have so many good qualities, and had stood with Great Britain in the conflict,
should fold up as it did. Their philosophy seemed to be that it was not worth while
any longer to contend against evil. They saved their beloved city from bombing,
and some of the other territory from that fate, but they flattened out completely
morally and every other way. These conditions were already at work in the
country, so they refused to go on with the fight.
Whatever else may be said about the democracies, one thing can be said
of them, that they are fighting a terrible evil, a diabolical power which has arisen
and is threatening all the good that is left in the land, all that you and I cherish,
everything of Christian principles.
One writer in Europe issued a book that has a wide circulation in those
lands. In that book he said, “The German people have the distinction of being the
first nation that discarded the Christian faith and adopted a religion that is suited
to their national characteristics.”
One country thought it was not worth while to contend against the evils
that were threatening the world; that a new order was coming in and they would
lay down arms and make the best of it. You can see what has happened as a
result of it.
What the Lord wants is that fighting spirit that will go on — not necessarily
in the military sense of today, but that will never give up the fight of right against
wrong, that will never be discouraged or lay down our arms, or ever rest at ease
so long as the battle is on. God rewards the man who has that spirit. You will find
that true all through this Epistle to the Hebrews. Paul tells them that they have
not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin. They had not reached the point
where they had laid down their lives; but there were many others who had. I
would rather die fighting, if I have to die, than to lie down and fold up.
Perhaps we remember the case of James Lawrence. He was a general on
the American side, who served during the War of 1812. He encountered an
English ship known as the “Peacock,” and took it captive. A little later he
engaged the “Shannon” with his one ship which he commanded. In this last battle
he was mortally wounded. As they brought him up to the deck, and were lowering
a boat to remove him, he said, “Don’t give up the ship!” And those words have
been immortalized in our history.
We also remember reading of John Paul Jones who lived during the
Revolutionary period. He was put in command of a ship named the “Bon Homme
Richard.” He engaged several English ships and took them captive. He had pluck
and nerve and that thing within him that would not give up. Finally he engaged
two English ships, the “Serapis” and the “Scarborough.” In the conflict his ship
was badly crippled and sinking. The commander of the “Serapis” appeared on
the deck and commanded him to surrender. Paul Jones replied, “I have not yet
begun to fight.” He maneuvered his ship beside the “Serapis,” threw cables
across it and lashed his sinking ship to that English ship. His crew went aboard
the English ship and fought hand to hand, overcame the crew, and took

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command of the “Serapis.” They brought both ships and crews to port. He was a
man who did not fold up; he continued fighting.
I think God wants to put within us in these days a little of that fighting spirit
that will never lie down on the job.

God’s Promise to Abraham

----Lesson Nine----
This lesson begins with Hebrews 6:13: Abraham is presented as an
example of patient endurance.
“For when God made promise to Abraham, because he
could swear by no greater, he sware by himself,
“Saying, Surely blessing I will bless thee, and
multiplying I will multiply thee.
“And so, after he had patiently endured, he obtained the
promise” (Hebrews 6:13-15).
The first promise that was made to Abraham is stated in Genesis:
“Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of
thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house,
unto a land that I will shew thee:
“And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless
thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing:
“And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him
that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be
blessed” (Genesis 12:1-3).
The Scripture states: “The God of glory had said. . .”; so the promise must
have been given first when he was yet in the land of Ur (Acts 7:2, 3).
In Galatians 3:8, we have these words of Paul:
“And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the
heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto
Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed.”
We have, therefore, in this promise to Abraham the germinating of the
Gospel. We have Paul’s word that God in this promise was preaching the Gospel
to him. The Gospel was, in its elementary form, given forth four hundred and
thirty years before the Law, so it took precedence over the Law.
Abraham was seventy-five years old at that time, and when Isaac was
born he was one hundred years old; so he waited patiently for a period of twenty-

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five years. This is what Paul has reference to when he sets forth Abraham as an
example of patient endurance. After he had patiently endured, he obtained the
promise. Again we read in Hebrews 10:36:
“For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done
the will of God, ye might receive the promise.”
Abraham had promptly obeyed the Word of God. At God’s call he
immediately arose, left his family, his kindred and his country, and by faith went
into a land that he knew not of, that he should afterwards receive for an
inheritance.
“He staggered not at the promise of God through
unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God” (Romans
4:20).
Therefore it was faith that carried Abraham through and gave him patience
during that entire period. If we want patience we shall have to have faith, the
same quality of faith that Abraham had, although we may not have the quantity
that he had which caused him to endure. God’s delays are not denials. He often
delays the fulfillment of His promises; but when He makes a promise it is going to
be fulfilled! And this one was especially sure because it concerned the Gospel.
Confirmed with an Oath
To show you how zealous God Was in the fulfillment of this promise, we
have it set forth in the 16th verse:
“For men verily swear by the greater: and an oath for
confirmation is to them an end of all strife.”
Men in those days confirmed a promise with an oath that stood to end all
further contention between them.
“Wherein God, willing more abundantly to shew unto the
heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it
by an oath” (Hebrews 6:17).
And that oath is in Genesis 22:16-18. This was after Isaac had been born
and grown up to at least the age of twenty. The Lord had spoken out of Heaven
and told Abraham to take Isaac and offer him up for a burnt offering. After he had
waited the twenty-five-year period for the fulfillment of God’s promise comes this
trial of faith. Abraham promptly complied and took Isaac to Mount Moriah to offer
him up for a burnt offering.
When Abraham was ready, after having bound Isaac and placed him upon
the altar to slay him as God had commanded, the angel of the Lord interposed
and said, “Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou any thing unto him.”
Then the Lord said:
“And the angel of the LORD called unto Abraham out of
heaven the second time,

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 “And said, By myself have I sworn, saith the LORD, for
because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy
son, thine only son:
“That in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I
will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the
sand which is upon the sea shore; and thy seed shall possess
the gate of his enemies;
“And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be
blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice”
(Genesis 22:15-18).
That is a repetition of the first promise He made, which is now confirmed
by an oath. And as the writer of Hebrews said, “Because he could swear by no
greater, he sware by himself.” Therefore we have the Gospel promise, 430 years
before the Law, confirmed by an oath. When the Lord took an oath and swore by
Himself because He was eternal, it meant that there was no abrogating of the
promise — it stood forever.
If He had sworn by the heavens and by the earth which shall come to an
end, His oath could come to an end at the same time. But He swore by Himself,
signifying the immutability of His counsel, that it could never change. It stands
forever.
Now, 430 years after this promise of the Gospel was made, the Law is
interposed until the Seed should come, the fulfillment of the Gospel promise. We
will turn to Galatians 3:15. This is also Paul’s Epistle.
“Brethren, I speak after the manner of men; Though it be
but a man’s covenant, yet if it be confirmed, no man
disannulleth, or addeth thereto.”
Even in covenants between men, when bound by an oath it stood; and
here God made a covenant when He swore by Himself.
“Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises
made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one,
And to thy seed, which is Christ” (Galatians 3:16).
Therefore that reference in Genesis points directly down to Christ,
Abraham’s seed.
“And this I say, that the covenant, that was confirmed
before of God in Christ, the law, which was four hundred and
thirty years after, cannot disannul, . . .”
Therefore the Law, coming in at Mount Sinai, never in anywise effected
the promise that God had made to Abraham and confirmed with an oath. That
stood, in no way being abridged or set aside or weakened by the coming in of the
Law. Hold these things in mind, because we are going to take them up later.

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 “. . . that it should make the promise of none effect”
(Galatians 3:17).
While the promise was confirmed with an oath, the Law was not. If the
oath signified that the promise was to stand forever, and the Law which was
added 430 years afterward was not confirmed with an oath, it would signify the
Law could be set aside at any time.
“For if the inheritance be of the law, it is no more of
promise: but God gave it to Abraham by promise.
“Wherefore then serveth the law?” (Galatians 3:18, 19).
The Law a Schoolmaster
That is what a good many are asking: What relation does the Law bear to
the Gospel? Where does it come in in God’s economy? Paul explains it here in
this chapter in Galatians: it was added because of transgressions. It was
necessary that the Law be given, because in the Law is set up God’s standard of
holiness, of righteousness, of the commandments that He makes if a man is to
inherit eternal life.
“It was added because of transgressions, till the seed
should come to whom the promise was made; and it was
ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator.
“Now a mediator is not a mediator of one, but God is
one.
“Is the law then against the promises of God? God
forbid: for if there had been a law given which could have
given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law”
(Galatians 3:19-21).
If it had been possible to institute a law that could bring eternal life to
humanity, the Law would have stood and have been confirmed with an oath. But
that was impossible. Therefore, the Law was added for one thing: to show men
their transgressions, their utter failure — falling short of God’s standard. The Law
is God’s standard. God puts that down as an exact requirement. That level must
be reached and attained to if men are to inherit eternal life. But it was never
ordained for the purpose of giving men eternal life.
“But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the
promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that
believe” (Galatians 3:22).
The Law was a means of concluding all under sin as Paul said: “I had not
known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet” (Romans 7:7). That
prohibition in the Law brought the knowledge of covetousness to Paul’s heart as
it does to any other man’s heart. Many of us knew the Law before we ever knew
Christ, and it brought us under condemnation, brought guilt upon us, showed us
our utter lack, how completely we had failed of God’s glory. And even if we did

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not know the letter of the Law, we at least had the Law of God written in our
conscience, accusing us or excusing us. So whether or not we know the law of
God as written in His Word, we certainly have it in our conscience. We are
inexcusable in any case.
“But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut
up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed”
(Galatians 3:23).
That had already germinated in the promise that was given to Abraham
back in Genesis, 1921 B. C. In the interval between the giving of the promise and
the coming of Christ, the Law was given, and it fulfilled its purpose.
“Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us
unto Christ, . . .”
That we might be justified by it? No.
“. . . that we might be justified by faith” (Galatians 3:24).
It acted as a schoolmaster, a lash upon us, to bring us to Christ, that it
would show all men the necessity of seeking Him in faith if they wanted eternal
life.
“But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a
schoolmaster” (Galatians 3:25).
And the schoolmaster is the Law. What has become of the Law in that
case? It has passed away, becoming inoperative. So we are no longer under the
Law. We are under grace.
“For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ
Jesus” (Galatians 3:26).
You can see how beautifully Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians fits in with his
Epistle to the Hebrews, although the two Epistles deal with the Law from two
different standpoints. They were addressed to two different classes of people.
“Wherein God, willing more abundantly to shew unto the
heirs of promise the immutability . . .”
That means unchangeableness, unalterableness. God’s Word will never
change.
“. . . of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath” (Hebrews 6:17).
Heirs of the Promise
“Know ye therefore that they which are of faith, the
same are the children of Abraham” (Galatians 3:7).
Being blood descendants of Abraham does not make us heirs of the
promise; we must be descendants of Abraham by faith.
“For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is
that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh:

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 “But he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and
circumcision is that of the heart” (Romans 2:28, 29).
An operation that the Lord performs upon the heart — a second definite
work of grace corresponding with circumcision in the Old Testament Law. All of
us who have believed and accepted Jesus Christ and had the change wrought in
our heart are the children of Abraham. Therefore, we are heirs of the promise.
God, in order to make that promise sure, did not leave it as He did the Law by
simply giving it to Moses and not confirming it by an oath; but he confirmed that
promise with His oath.
That is just how sure the Gospel is to the heirs of the promise. Can you
not see then the superiority which the Gospel, from the very beginning, from its
very inception, has taken over the Law?
“That by two immutable things, . . .”
His promise in the first place was immutable, and then His oath that
confirmed the promise made it doubly immutable.
“. . . in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might
have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold
upon the hope set before us” (Hebrews 6:18).
That hope is realized in Christ Jesus. The promise which was made to
Abraham was elementary. The Gospel at that time was in its germinating form;
but little by little, step by step, precept upon precept, it has unfolded: by example,
by sacrifice, by Temple worship, by the order of priests and their service. Every
step pointed to the fulfillment of that germinating Gospel which finally found its
completion in Christ Jesus in every form. So Jesus becomes our hope. That is
what Paul says about Him:
“Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the commandment
of God our Saviour, and Lord Jesus Christ, which is our hope”
(I Timothy 1:1).
Christ Jesus is that hope today. All the converging lines of the Old
Testament prophecies meet and focus in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ,
who is become the hope of those who are the heirs of the promise today.
“. . . we might have a strong consolation, . . .”
That word “consolation” has more than just a sentimental meaning. It has
a meaning of fulfilling that which nothing else in all the world could fulfill: that
upon which all our hopes, aspirations, and desires center.
“. . . who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope
set before us” (Hebrews 6:18).
Cities of Refuge
That harks back, I believe, to the Cities of Refuge in the Old Testament.
About the time that the Children of Israel were to enter the Promised Land, God

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gave Moses instructions that, when they came into that land, six cities were to be
set aside: three upon the west side of the Jordan and three upon the east side.
They were distributed throughout the area of those two districts in a way that
would make them easy of access. Roads were laid out leading to those cities,
and they were plainly marked as Cities of Refuge. It was ordained that if any man
had unwittingly slain a fellow Israelite he could flee to the nearest City of Refuge,
and by entering that city he would be subject to trial. If there was found evidence
that he was not guilty of murder, or that he had had no hatred toward the man
who was slain, or had not plotted it in any way — it was purely accidental — he
was protected. He must remain in the City of Refuge until the avenger, a relative
of the one who was slain, had died. In those days they did not have officers of
the law to execute judgment as we have.
The avenger took the place of the officer, and he sat to avenge the
slaying. But if the man was taken into the City of Refuge, the avenger could not
lay his hand upon him. He was free so long as he remained in the City of Refuge.
If he ventured out, and the avenger found him, that was his own fault. He was
subject then to be slain. in order to be safe, he had to remain in the City of
Refuge until the death of the high priest. After that he could go back to his
allotment of land.
The Cities of Refuge are a beautiful type of Christ. He is our Refuge.
Those who were under the Law were being pursued, as it were, by the avenger.
The Law is strict to the letter. Jesus said that not one jot or tittle should ever pass
from it until all was fulfilled. That is just how exacting it was and those were the
lines which were laid down for a man who was under the Law and not under
Grace.
In Christ Jesus we have, as it were, a City of Refuge to which we may flee
when being pursued; and having gained entrance there, we are amply secure
from the avenger. The Law no longer has any power over us, any more than the
avenger had power over that man who took refuge in the City; but with this
difference: in the City of Refuge, if the man was found guilty of an offence and of
having premeditated that man’s death, he was turned over to the avenger and
was executed. But mercy even covers the guilty.
We all have been at one time in open transgressions and violations of the
laws of God; yet so extensive and far-reaching is the mercy that God has
provided that however deep the guilt may be, however heavy the load upon us,
grace prevails when we find entrance into the Refuge. That is what he had
reference to when he speaks of those who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon
the hope set before us. Paul had very much the same thought in mind when he
said to Timothy, “Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life” (I Timothy
6:12). We must have that aggressiveness that will lay hold, even as the man who
was being pursued by the avenger fled with all his strength to reach that City
before he was over taken.
How pertinent is this point in the Gospel today, because we are living in
days of vengeance, when vengeance is beginning to replace mercy! Mercy is still

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available, but we can see the time fast approaching when God’s vengeance will
be poured out upon this world. That was what was prophesied by Isaiah.
“The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the
LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek;
he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim
liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them
that are bound;
“To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, and the
day of vengeance of our God” (Isaiah 61:1, 2).
When Jesus stood in the synagogue in Nazareth and read those words He
read down to the point: “to proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, . . .” and
He closed the Book. There was not a period there, just a comma; but He closed
the Book at that point, and read no farther. Why? Because the day of vengeance
had not arrived. That little comma represents a hiatus of nearly 2,000 years. But
now that 2,000 years has just about expired; and we are coming to the days of
vengeance.
“Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both
sure and stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil”
(Hebrews 6:19).

The Priesthood of Christ

and of Melchisedec
----Lesson Ten----

The Apostle Paul now goes back to the previous subject of Christ as our
High Priest.
“Whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus,
made an high priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec”
(Hebrews 6:20).
This subject was taken up in the fifth chapter of Hebrews, but was
interrupted by that long exhortation and warning against apostasy. In the seventh
chapter he again mentions Melchisedec.
Melchisedec was a mysterious character. The first mention of him is in
Genesis 14. When Abraham returned from the pursuit of the kings who had come
down to Sodom and had taken Lot and his family and other spoils in the city,
Abraham overtook them, despoiled them, brought back the spoils and the
families, and restored them to Sodom.

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 While he and his men were there, Melchisedec came out to greet
Abraham and to bring him refreshment. He blessed Abraham; and that blessing
was without doubt a repetition of the same blessing with which God had originally
blessed Abraham: that he would be the father of a great nation, and that through
him all the nations of the earth would be blessed.
Abraham recognized Melchisedec’s position and the fact of his being a
priest of the most High God. Abraham paid him a tenth of all his spoils. That is
the instance which the writer of Hebrews takes up now. Had this been all there
was to it, it would probably have been just a passing incident. But that which
makes it all the more important is the fact that five hundred years later David, in
the 110th Psalm, writes:
“The LORD hath sworn, and will not repent, Thou art a
priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek” (Psalm 110:4).
This is a Messianic Psalm. The Lord Jehovah here is addressing these
words to the Messiah: “The LORD said unto my Lord.” Those are the opening
words of this Psalm; therefore this is a prophecy concerning Christ. And that is all
David had to say about it.
No other mention is made of Melchisedec throughout Scripture until in this
seventh chapter where the writer of Hebrews takes up an explanation of this
strange character. It is important because of the bearing it has upon the office of
Jesus Christ.
“For this Melchisedec, king of Salem, priest of the most
high God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of
the kings, and blessed him;
“To whom also Abraham gave a tenth part of all; first
being by interpretation King of righteousness, and after that
also King of Salem, which is, King of peace” (Hebrews 7:1, 2).
Melchisedec was a priest, and he was outside the Abrahamic line entirely.
He may have been a personage who had found the true and living God, perhaps
without any of God’s inspired revelation at hand, just as Job had; or as the wise,
men who came to visit Jesus had, through their honesty of heart and seeking
after the truth. They found the true and living God.
When I was attending Princeton University, one of the professors told of
an incident up in the northern part of Japan where lived remnants of a former
race preceding the Japanese. They are a white race, and in the remote regions
their descendants still live. Missionaries went up among them and found an
elderly man with a flowing white beard who gave every evidence of having found
the true and the living God. He was free from all false worship — no idol worship.
He had a high standard of morality, and apparently, without any missionary
influence or having had the inspired Word of God brought to him, he had found
his way through to the true and living God.

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 There are these isolated cases where outside of the usual knowledge of
the plan of redemption are those who have found their way through to God.
Some even believe that Melchisedec was Jesus Christ revealed here. At any rate
he is a most wonderful character.
“Without father, without mother, without descent,
having neither beginning of days, nor end of life; but made like
unto the Son of God; abideth a priest continually”
(Hebrews 7:3).
The point of being without father or mother may mean, so far as the
Scriptural account of him is concerned, that his genealogy is not given. This is in
contrast to what was required of the Levitical priesthood. Their genealogy was
kept very strictly, because their succession to the priesthood depended upon
their genealogy, whether it measured up to the requirement of the Mosaic Law. If
it did, they succeeded to the priesthood.
But here was one who was a priest of the most High God without any
genealogy. He appears upon the pages of history and disappears, having no
beginning and no end. The writer uses this as a type of Christ, for that is what
David made out of it when he said, “Thou art a priest for ever after the order of
Melchizedek.” This is that Melchisedek, a type of the priesthood of Jesus Christ
which came later.
“Now consider how great this man was, unto whom
even the patriarch Abraham gave the tenth of the spoils”
(Hebrews 7:4).
We are given so little history of him that we do not know very much about
his greatness, only this: that he was a priest of the most High God, and that he
was also king, which is another divergence from the Levitical priesthood. They
were never kings; they were priests only. Here is one who was both king and
priest in perhaps the most important city of the Promised Land, Salem — which
was afterwards Jerusalem. That reminds us of our being kings and priests of
God, as is told in Revelation 1:5, 6: “Unto him that loved us, and washed us from
our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his
Father.”
Christ as Prophet, Priest and King
Those are the offices which Jesus Christ Himself assumed, and for which
He was ordained. He entered officially into His office as Prophet when He was
baptized and the anointing of the Lord came upon Him, and He began His
ministry. He entered officially into His office of Priest when He ascended on High
and disappeared from the sight of the disciples as they were gathered there upon
the Mount of Olives. He entered into the Holiest of All in Heaven. He will enter
His office as King when He leaves His mediatorial Throne and comes back to this
world again.
But at the same time, these offices are all considered as adhering to Him,
irrespective of any date or time. For instance, Pilate ‘said to Him, “Art thou the

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King of the Jews?” And He answering said unto him, “Thou sayest it” (Mark
15:2). He was a King then although He had not yet officially entered upon His
reign. He was also a Prophet and Priest at that same time. So His Priesthood,
His prophetic office and His kingship all continue without beginning and without
end.
To understand the greatness of Melchisedec we shall have to have a little
idea of the greatness of Abraham. Here was Abraham in the land of the
Chaldees. We are told in Acts, in the speech of Stephen, that God called
Abraham in Ur before He ever called him in Haran. He simply had tarried at
Haran, perhaps on account of the sickness of his father who died there. Then the
call was repeated in Haran. God called him out from among his brethren and his
kindred and from his country, into an unknown land.
There He tried him out: tried his patience, tried his faith, his endurance.
And because Abraham stood through the trials, he became the head, not only of
a great nation, but through him should all the nations of the world be blessed. Not
only that, but through his line there should come that Seed that would be the
channel of blessings God promised to Abraham. He was the greatest among the
patriarchs — the father of the faithful. He stands out as being a monument of
what God can do for a man who makes an unconditional surrender, as Abraham
did.
Now we find, as this chapter brings out, that Melchisedec was greater than
Abraham: Abraham gave him a tenth, and Melchisedec blessed him. The lesser
is blessed of the greater. That is true also in the paying of tithes. Abraham
recognized the greatness of this man.
The Levites received tithes. That was provided under the Old Testament
dispensation. They lived upon them, and received the tithes from the people. But
Abraham was ahead of the Levitical priesthood and stood out far above them,
but he paid tithes to Melchisedec; he recognized Melchisedec’s authority and
position. That places Melchisedec far, far above the Levitical priesthood.
“But he whose descent is not counted from them
received tithes of Abraham, and blessed him that had the
promises.
“And without all contradiction the less is blessed of the
better.
“And here men that die receive tithes; . . .” (Hebrews
7:6-8).
The Levitical priesthood was subject to death; and for that reason there
had to be an order of succession constantly replacing them.
“. . . but there he receiveth them, of whom it is
witnessed that he liveth.
“And as I may so say, Levi also, who receiveth tithes,
payed tithes in Abraham.

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 “For he was yet in the loins of his father, when
Melchisedec met him.
“If therefore perfection were by the Levitical priesthood,
(for under it the people received the law,) . . .”
(Hebrews 7:8-11).
Law and Priesthood Inseparable
Now mark you, the priesthood and the Law were inseparable. What was
the establishment of the priesthood for? For the administration of the Law, that it
might be carried out in the ceremonial law which God ordained. Therefore, they
are inseparable; they stand together or fall together.
“. . . what further need was there that another priest
should rise after the order of Melchisedec?” (Hebrews 7:11).
If God had planned that the consummation of things should be carried out
through this Levitical priesthood that He ordained, why was there any provision
made for another priesthood? In the very economy of God there was a limited
place for the Levitical priesthood. It served its purpose.
“For the priesthood being changed, there is made of
necessity a change also of the law” (Hebrews 7:12).
The priesthood was changed from the Levitical order to the order of
Melchisedec in the person of Jesus: and therefore there was, of course, a
change of the Law. Christ was of the tribe of Judah, and nothing was said
concerning that tribe in regard to the priesthood. The priesthood was limited to
the descendants of Aaron, of the tribe of Levi.
“For it is evident that our Lord sprang out of Juda; of
which tribe Moses spake nothing concerning priesthood.
“And it is yet far more evident: for that after the
similitude of Melchisedec there ariseth another priest,
“Who is made, not after the law of a carnal
commandment, . . .” (Hebrews 7:14-16).
That is not after the law of mortal man, as expressed there, according to
the flesh; but after the law of an endless life, an immortal life. That was the basis
upon which the new priesthood was established.
“For he testifieth, Thou art a priest for ever after the
order of Melchisedec” (Hebrews 7:17).
There is therefore an annulling of that commandment that went before.
With the coming in of the New Commandment that Old Commandment is
automatically annulled; it becomes ineffective.
“For the law made nothing perfect, but the bringing in of
a better hope did; . . .” (Hebrews 7:19).

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 Are we to understand by that that righteousness was not attained under
the dispensation of the Law? Or does it mean that there was a defect in the Law
by which it was impossible to attain unto righteousness? Paul hits the mark in
that matter when he says:
“For what the law could not do, in that it was weak
through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of
sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh:
“That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in
us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit”
(Romans 8:3, 4).
The inability of the Law to bring about perfection was not through any
defects or imperfection in the Law itself; but it was on account of the imperfection
of man, his inability to measure up to the Law.
“. . . but the bringing in of a better hope did [ that better
hope was Jesus Christ]; by the which we draw nigh unto God”
(Hebrews 7:19).
That is brought out in the contrast with the old tabernacle service where
the people stood near when the high priest went into the Holiest of All to minister.
The congregation drew nigh on the outside of the Tabernacle and worshiped
while the high priest ministered in the Holiest of All before the Mercy Seat.
“And inasmuch as not without an oath he was made
priest” (Hebrews 7:20).
The covenant that was made with Abraham was also confirmed with an
oath. It was the Gospel in its germinating form in the Old Testament, not yet
unfolded nor developed. But there the promise was made and confirmed to
Abraham with an oath, before the Law ever came in. And we find the priesthood
after the order of Melchisedec promised. That also was confirmed with an oath,
both of them taking precedence over the Dispensation of the Law. Its being
confirmed with an oath contrasts it with the Law in that the old priesthood was not
confirmed with an oath. In confirming it with an oath, God swore by Himself
because He could swear by none higher, that both the promises to Abraham and
the priest hood after the order of Melchisedec were eternal — never ending.
Inasmuch as God Himself is eternal, He swore by Himself.
“(For those priests were made without an oath; but this
with an oath by him that said unto him, The Lord sware and
will not repent, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of
Melchisedec:)
“By so much was Jesus made a surety [word “surety”
means mediator] of a better testament” (Hebrews 7:21, 22).
That word “testimony” is the same word that is in other places translated
“covenant.” When we speak of the Old Testament and the New Testament we

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could just as well say Old and New Covenant, because the words are the same
in the original. There He was made the Mediator of a better Covenant.
“And they truly were many priests, because they were
not suffered to continue by reason of death” (Hebrews 7:23).
That is why there was a succession in the descendency of Aaron, that the
priest’s office should never be left vacant but should be filled from generation to
generation by Aaron’s successors. But that was no longer necessary, because
here was One who was made after the power of an endless life: therefore there
was no order or succession, but one Priest to abide forever.
“But this man, because he continueth ever, hath an
unchangeable priesthood.
“Wherefore he is able also to save them to the
uttermost. . .”(Hebrews 7:24, 25).
Perfect Salvation
That word “uttermost” is one of the most emphatic words to be found in
the Greek language. It means not only a point of time — forever; but it means in
point of perfection — that it is a perfect salvation.
There is nothing wrong with the salvation which the Lord offers humanity.
If there are any failures or any shortcomings or anything in which that salvation
appears weak, remember it is not the salvation. It is the same condition that
prevailed under the Law — the weakness of man and not the weakness of what
God has provided. Some marvel at what appears in certain ones to be a weak
salvation — they are tottering. It is not any fault of the work which the Lord has
performed. If there is any weakness, it is in the one who has failed to lay hold of
the Lord in order to have sufficient power to enable him to stand. This salvation is
unto the uttermost. That means it is not only perfect, but it is all-comprehensive
and to the entire bounds of the earth, taking in all of humanity, all races, all walks
of life, every kindred, nation and tongue. You can see what a tremendous word
that is.
“. . . that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to
make intercession for them.
“For such an high priest became us, who is holy,
harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher
than the heavens” (Hebrews 7:25, 26).
Is there anything left unsaid that could be said? That means “without one
taint, absolute perfection” in the spiritual sense — holy God Himself with all His
holiness; and separate from sinners but not in the sense that He withheld Himself
from sinners. The Pharisees brought the complaint that He ate with sinners and
was found with them. But He was entirely separate from their sins and iniquities,
and not a partaker of any of their evil ways. In that same sense the people of
God are separate from sinners — but not in the sense of “holier than thou.”

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 “Who needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer
up sacrifice, first for his own sins, . . .” (Hebrews 7:27).
He had no sin. If you will read the Levitical Law you will find that when the
priests came to offer sacrifice, a bullock was offered; and they took of the blood
of the bullock and went into the sanctuary and offered it first for their own sins.
Those priests served by groups. Next they offered it for the cleansing of the
sanctuary. Then was a second offering made, and they took of that blood and
offered it for the sins of the people in the same way on the Day of Atonement.
That was the day that the high priest went into the Holiest of All. That occurred
on the 10th day of the 7th month just before the Feast of Tabernacles, at the end
of the harvest.
The Day of Atonement became typical of the Day of Grace in which Jesus
Christ became a scapegoat, not for the Jews alone, but for all the world.
“. . . for this he did once, when he offered up himself”
(Hebrews 7:27).
The sacrifice which Jesus offered is an availing sacrifice at all times. Just
as the office of priest was filled by one generation following another, so the
sacrifices themselves were also repeated. The high priest repeated this sacrifice
once a year, and there were also the daily morning and evening sacrifices by the
priests in their regular course. This was kept up continually while the Tabernacle
and the Temple stood.
However the Jewish people might have been delinquent along moral lines,
and failed to keep the commandments of God, there was one thing about which
they were punctual: and that was in keeping the order of sacrifices just as
prescribed by the Law of Moses. If they failed in that it was a terrible breach. That
is why Jesus told them that they could strain at a gnat and swallow a camel.
They offered tithes of mint and cummin and anise, and failed of the weightier
matters of the Law, of mercy, justice and faith. He said, “These ought ye to have
done, and not to leave the other undone” (Matthew 23:23). That is, they should
have kept the whole Law; and that not only from a perfunctory, mechanical
standpoint, a habit they fell into until it became just a ceremonial routine day after
day. The Law should be kept in the Spirit.
The Lord ordained that the Law should be kept in such a way that His
people should be in communion with Him, in touch with Him continually. If our
worship falls into a mechanical routine and becomes a mere ceremony, we have
lost the kernel of the whole thing; we have nothing left but the husk. That is
where the nominal church today throughout the land has utterly failed.
Jesus offered Himself once for all, a standing sacrifice never needing to
be repeated. He offered Himself once, and has been availabie from that time on
down throughout the countless generations of humanity, for every man, woman
and child.
“For the law maketh men high priests which have
infirmity; but the word of the oath, which was since the law,

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 maketh the Son, who is consecrated for evermore”
(Hebrews 7:28).
It established Him. “Consecrated” means perfected; that is, having
completed or finished perfectly the work which God planned.
Our High Priest
In the 8th chapter, Paul begins to sum up and bring out the high points of
what he has declared in the 7th chapter. He starts out by saying:
“Now of the things which we have spoken this is the
sum: We have such an high priest, who is set on the right
hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens”
(Hebrews 8:1).
Jesus is exalted above the Levites. No Levitical priest had the place Jesus
did. The position of high priest was the highest, even higher than that of the
kingship in Israel, because the high priest was independent of the king; he paid
no tithes. We found in the paying of tithes the lesser pays tithes to the greater, as
was the case of Abraham and Melchisedec. So the priest had an exalted place
as a representative of the people before God.
But here Christ is exalted above the Levitical priesthood — not in any
earthly position which He held, but in the heavenly position He holds at the right
hand of the majesty on High, the highest place of honor in all Heaven. In
Philippians we read:
“And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled
himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of
the cross.
“Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given
him a name which is above every name:
“That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of
things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the
earth;
“And that every tongue should confess that Jesus
Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father”
(Philippians 2:8-11).
That is the exaltation which was given Jesus. It seems to me that the
Priesthood of Christ in a large part of Christendom is not given the place it
deserves; it is not preached. Jesus’ ascension from the Mount of Olives into
Heaven on that great day when His disciples were gathered there was for the
express purpose of entering upon this Priesthood. That was the one great
purpose of His ascension.
A large part of this Epistle to the Hebrews is devoted to His Priesthood. It
seems to be only alluded to in other portions of Scripture. It embraces his whole
mediatorial office for mankind. It is through His Priesthood that He becomes a

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Mediator, just exactly as the Levitical priests were mediators. We found that the
office of a priest is to represent the people before God. You can see then how
essential His incarnation was, that He should take on the form of man and be
made like unto His brethren if in His priestly office up there He was to be the
representative of men here upon earth — which He is. We see that He stands
there with His glorified body at the right hand of the Throne; and for these
nineteen centuries, He has been fulfilling that priestly capacity.
“A minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle,
which the Lord pitched, and not man” (Hebrews 8:2).
That opens up a marvelous train of thought that is taken up a little later.
This was the true Tabernacle into which Jesus entered. The Tabernacle in the
wilderness was not, in this sense, the true Tabernacle. It is brought in for
contrast.
“For every high priest is ordained to offer gifts and
sacrifices: wherefore it is of necessity that this man have
somewhat also to offer” (Hebrews 8:3).
The high priests in their functioning as priests brought the sacrifices and
presented them before the Lord, and also the gifts of the people. So Jesus, if He
is the true antitype of this prototype which went before, must also have gifts and
sacrifices to offer,
We have found what the sacrifice is: not bulls or goats or oxen or any of
these sacrifices which constituted the offerings under the Levitical priesthood, but
the offering of Himself as a sacrifice. And so far as gifts are concerned, we have
it presented in Revelation 8:3, 4.
“And another angel came and stood at the altar, having
a golden censer; . . .”
The high priest alone had a golden censer; the others had brazen
censers. So this identifies the angel as Jesus, the High Priest in Heaven.
“. . . and there was given unto him much incense, that
he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden
altar which was before the throne.”
The Tabernacle a Pattern
In the Tabernacle in the wilderness there was the golden altar, just before
the veil which divided the Holy Place from the Holiest of All. You can see that the
Throne of God in Heaven has its parallel in the Tabernacle. The furnishings and
the compartments of the Tabernacle will be taken up in the 9th chapter more
specifically.
“And the smoke of the incense, which came with the
prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the
angel’s hand.”

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 Here is the gift which He offers: the prayers of the saints offered up unto
the Lord. That gives us an understanding of the incense which was kept burning
continuously upon the golden altar, the prayers of the saints ascending unto the
Lord.
“For if he were on earth, he should not be a priest,
seeing that there are priests that offer gifts according to the
law” (Hebrews 8:4).
While He was upon earth He was not in a priestly capacity. What was His
capacity on earth? That of Apostle, bringing God’s message to this world. That
was why His three-and-a-half years’ ministry was devoted to preaching, to
declaring the message of God. That was why He delivered the Sermon on the
Mount, the interpretation of the Law in the light of the New Dispensation. He was
God’s prophet to this world.
“Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly
things, as Moses was admonished of God when he was about
to make the tabernacle: for, See, saith he, that thou make all
things according to the pattern shewed to thee in the mount”
(Hebrews 8:5).
If you will read the description of the Tabernacle, of its furnishings and the
compartments, you will find the most specific directions. The dimensions are
given of not only the Tabernacle itself, but of the altars and table of shewbread,
of the Ark of the Covenant and all the other appointments of the Tabernacle in
detail just as they should be.
In addition to that, He admonished Moses that he should see that all
things were done exactly as was shown him in the mount. The instructions were
all given him in the Mount the forty days that Moses was up there. Why were
such explicit and specific directions given? Because it was a pattern of the
Heavenly things. That was to be a model. All things there were in perfect order
just as they had been ordained in Heaven. That was why God gave them, that
they might serve as an object lesson not only to Israel but to us today as the
heavenly order of things.
We find then that the Tabernacle was a shadow of the heavenly
Tabernacle, with another Priest. That would mean that the Levitical priesthood
was also a shadow of the true priesthood. That would mean that the Tabernacle
itself was subordinate to the real Tabernacle, that the Levitical priesthood was
subordinate to the real Priesthood. And now we come to another point:
“But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, . . .”
(Hebrews 8:6).
And if the Tabernacle and its service were only shadows, what are we
going to make out of the priesthood itself? That was just a shadow of the true
Covenant which God had made. We find here that this better Covenant of which
He speaks is as much better as was the priesthood. We see the exalted place to
which Jesus was raised in entering upon His priesthood. He was exalted far

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above all principalities and powers. And if that is the case, the Covenant of which
He was priest is exalted just as much, just as high above the Old Covenant; for it
says:
“. . . by how much also he is the mediator of a better
covenant, which was established upon better promises”
(Hebrews 8:6).

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