Not a Mere Human

 Hebrews 8:1-13

Good morning, saints!  We’re continuing in our series on the book of Hebrews titled “Jesus is Greater”.  We’re turning a little bit of a corner this week.  So far, chapters 1-7 have focused on Jesus’ superiority above the leaders of the Old Covenant.  We’ve looked at how Jesus is greater than or superior to the angels who gave the Law to Moses and Israel.  We’ve considered how Jesus is greater than Moses who delivered Israel out of Egypt through the wilderness and to the Promised Land.  And, we’ve seen that Jesus is superior to the Levitical priests who made the sacrifices to atone for the sins of the people of Israel. 

 

In chapters 8-10, we are going to see the superior sacrificial work of Jesus, our High Priest.

 

Last week, Hebrews 7:22 told us, “Jesus has become the guarantor of a better covenant.”  Today, in chapter 8, we will consider the better covenant of Jesus. Next week, in chapter 9, we will explore the greater and perfect sanctuary in heaven where Jesus has appeared for us in God’s presence.  Then, in chapter 10, the following week, we will look into the better sacrifice of Jesus, the one sacrifice for sins for all time.  Hebrews is an exciting book, filled with wonders.  It is amazing what the Lord Jesus has done for us!  Let’s pray and we will dive into Hebrews chapter 8.

 

Lord Jesus, thank You that You have seen our weakness and our sin and that You have had compassion on us.  Thank You that You are the guarantor of an everlasting covenant which does not depend on what we do but rather what You have already done for us.  We are amazed by You.  Thank You for Your grace and mercy, in Your precious Name we pray.  Amen.

 

Now the main point of what we are saying is this: We do have such a high priest, who sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven. – Hebrews 8:1

 

There is an interesting pronoun right here at the beginning of this chapter.  The author of Hebrews uses the word “we” many times, 64 times according to the online bible site, blueletterbible.org.  Most of the time, the authors of Hebrews use the word “we” because they are explaining things that apply to all believers which would include their readers and themselves.  That’s the meaning of the second “we” in Hebrews 8:1.  “We [believers] do have such a high priest.”

 

Less frequently, but also in chapters 5, 6, here in chapter 8 and finally in chapter 13, “we” is used to describe the authors of Hebrews 13.  “Now the main point of what we are saying is this …”  There is apparently more than one author that contributed to the book of Hebrews.  It may be a bit of a surprise, but having multiple authors of the books of the New Testament is not rare.  Just over half, 15 of the 27 books of the New Testament, are attributed to single authorship.  There are 3 books which depend heavily on eyewitness testimony.  The remaining 9 books, including Hebrews, are attributed to two or more authors.

 

And you might be thinking, well what difference does that make?  I just think it is neat how God is working through all who follow Him, not just a select few.

 

Paul and Timothy, writing together in II Corinthians 3:2-3, tell the Corinthians, 

 

You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everyone.  You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. – II Corinthians 3:2-3 

 

By extension, we too are a part of that letter from Christ as the result of the ministry of those who have gone before us.  And the ultimate author is not a person, but God Himself by His Spirit.  Keep that in mind because we are coming back to it at the end of chapter 8.

 

Okay, let’s zoom out and look at the rest of Hebrews 8:1.  In view of what has come in the previous chapters, the writer(s) of Hebrews tells us the main point is that we have a worthy high priest, one who sat down at the right hand of God the Father, the Majesty who sits on His throne in heaven.

 

Jesus is our forever priest who comes before and extends after the Levitical priests of the Old Testament.  When you have a physical job and an immediate deadline, you don’t sit down until the work is done.  Jesus has completed the work of salvation.  You can’t add to it.  That work is done, and Jesus can “sit down.”  Additionally, sitting at the right hand of the throne is a place of royalty and honor.  Jesus has the perfect authority to sit at the right hand of God the Father.

 

Let’s add verse 2.

 

Now the main point of what we are saying is this: We do have such a high priest, who sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven, and who serves in the sanctuary, the true tabernacle set up by the Lord, not by a mere human being. – Hebrews 8:1-2

 

Jesus has sat down at the right hand of the throne of Majesty, and He ministers and serves in the sanctuary.

 

Hebrews 7:24-27 explains, 

 

Because Jesus lives forever, He has a permanent priesthood. Therefore He is able to save completely those who come to God through Him, because He always lives to intercede for them.  Such a high priest truly meets our need--one who is holy, blameless, pure, set apart from sinners, exalted above the heavens.  Unlike the other high priests, he does not need to offer sacrifices day after day, first for His own sins, and then for the sins of the people. He sacrificed for their sins once for all when He offered himself. – Hebrews 7:24-27

 

Contrast Jesus’ service as an intercessor like it says in Hebrews 7:25, 

 

He always lives to intercede, to save completely those who come to God through Him. – Hebrews 7:25

 

I John 2:1 says something similar.  

 

We have an advocate with the Father—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. – I John 2:1

 

Contrast our righteous intercessor Jesus with the high priest of the Levitical system who could only enter the Holy of Holies of the earthly tabernacle one time per year.

 

Jesus serves in the true tabernacle in heaven.  There are various pieces of furniture and utensils in the earthly tabernacle, but there are no chairs.  The Levitical priests who worked in the earthly temple never sat down because their work was never perfected or complete.  Jesus went into the true tabernacle in heaven and His perfect and complete work as high priest allowed Him to sit down at the right hand of God the Father.  More on the true tabernacle next week.  

 

Every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices, and so it was necessary for this one also to have something to offer. – Hebrews 8:3

 

Back in Hebrews 5:1, it explains that every high priest is appointed to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins.  Those gifts and offerings have a specific purpose.  Jesus as high priest also had to make an offering.  He offered Himself.  John the Baptist announced the Messiah Jesus saying, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.” (John 1:29)  John the apostle saw this fulfilled in his Revelation vision, “a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain, standing at the center of the throne.” (Revelation 5:6)  Jesus came as the Lamb of God and was slain and has triumphed. (Revelation 5:5) He is worthy, worthy to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise! (Revelation 5:12)

 

If He were on earth, He would not be a priest, for there are already priests who offer the gifts prescribed by the law.  They serve at a sanctuary that is a copy and shadow of what is in heaven. This is why Moses was warned when he was about to build the tabernacle: “See to it that you make everything according to the pattern shown you on the mountain.” – Hebrews 8:4-5

 

In verse 4, we have a hint about the date when the book of Hebrews was written.  At the time of writing, there were “already priests.”  The work of temple was active.  That is one of several evidences in Hebrews that this letter was written prior to 70 AD.

 

We’ve talked earlier in the series how the earthly priests had to be descendants of Levi, specifically sons of Aaron.  However, Jesus is a descendant of the tribe of Judah, so He does not meet the requirements of service in the earthly temple.  But, as we read, the earthly temple is not the true tabernacle or sanctuary.  It is a copy or a shadow of it.

 

Back in Exodus 25:40, when God told Moses to make everything according to the pattern shown, we are not told why.  Here in Hebrews chapter 8, it’s like we get an “Easter egg,” an explanation of the reason for something we saw before that we didn’t fully understand.

 

I don’t know how many of you pay attention to the seemingly never ending streams of Star Wars content and the Marvel Cinematic Universe.  On top of that content, there are herds or hordes of commentators that are explaining all the nearly hidden pieces of information in these complex movies and programs.

 

J.R.R. Tolkien, author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, and a creative mastermind in his own right wrote an essay titled “On Fairy-Stories.”  In it he explained,

 

The realm of fairy-story is wide and deep and high and filled with many things: all manner of beasts and birds are found there; shoreless seas and stars uncounted; beauty that is an enchantment, and an ever-present peril; both joy and sorrow as sharp as swords.

 

Tolkein believed that humanity’s desire or drive to make fantasy stories or fairy stories was a result of the creative likeness which God placed in humankind at creation.  But reading that quote from Tolkein where it said “stars uncounted” struck me to think about how our fantasy or fairy stories can only be a copy or a shadow (sometimes dark shadows) of the greater reality.

Tolkein wrote of stars uncounted in fantasy.  He wrote that or first presented it in 1939.  That got me to thinking about how many stars did we think there were there back then?  And that, made me think about how many stars has mankind identified over time?

 

What I’ve tried to capture is the number of stars either charted or cataloged over time.  A human can see 5000 or so stars with the naked eye.  Galileo’s first telescope probably multiplied that by about 30 to 150,000 stars.  But, it had a tiny field of view.  So small that you couldn’t even see half the moon at one time.  Still, Galileo recognized that objects previously thought of as singular were in fact made of a bunch of individual stars, like the Beehive Cluster.  Previously thought of as one thing, Galileo thought it was made of ~30 stars.  In the 20^th century, the same cluster was said to have 400 stars.  In the present day, the number is 1000 for that same object that has been visible to the naked eye since people looked to the heavens.  Coming to the present imaging technology, the situation is not much different.  The Hubble Space Telescope can see more objects than have been cataloged.  However, we know that it can’t resolve many of the objects which we now realize are enormous and made of many other stars, nebulae or even other galaxies!

 

So, let’s quickly look at what we’ve thought was important enough to write down or map through the millennia.

 

Year    Stars   

-4200   11        Burzahama in India where oldest settlements date back to about 4000 BC a stone carving was been unearthed which maps the first known supernova

-4000   36        The ancient Egyptians divided the sky into 36 decans or constellations

-1600   30        Nebra Sky Disc was made in Germany

-1470   200      Tomb of Senenmut

-350     810      Shi Shen, an ancient Chinese astronomer

-135     850      Hipparchus, an ancient Greek astronomer

150      1022    Ptolemy, a more known Greek astronomer (and originator of the Planetary Hypothesis)

500      1345    Dunhuang Star Chart, Tang dynasty

1092    1464    Chinese astronomer Su Song

1627    1405    Rudolphine Tables, a star catalogue and planetary tables published by Johannes Kepler, using observational data collected by Tycho Brahe, contemporaries of Galileo

1801    47,390 Jérôme Lalande published the Histoire céleste française in 1801

1855    320,000           Bonner Durchmusterung was published by Friedrich Wilhelm Argelander, Adalbert Krüger, and Eduard Schönfeld

1950    4,600,000        Catalogue astrographique (Astrographic Catalogue) was part of the international Carte du Ciel programme

1989    20,000,000      Guide Star Catalog (GSC), also known as the Hubble Space Telescope, Guide Catalog (HSTGC), is a star catalog compiled to support the Hubble Space Telescope

2020    1,811,709,771 GAIA Early Data Release 3

100,000,000,000         Estimate of the number of stars in our galaxy, the Milky Way (but it could be 200 billion or more)

1.00E+24        Estimate of the number of stars in the universe, 10 times the number of cups of water in all the oceans on earth

 

It is the glory of God to conceal a matter; to search out a matter is the glory of king. – Proverbs 25:2

 

The creation is filled with wonders that scientists of all kinds continue to discover and explore.  I chose to talk about astronomy for three reasons.  One, it’s relatively easy to make quantifiable.  Two, I’m fascinated by space.  And three, Scripture tells us specifically that the heavens in part are there to help us grasp something of the glory of God.

 

The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands. – Psalm 19:1

 

How much more complex and amazing is reality than any fantasy world that humankind can create?

 

I’m sure I mentioned before, but I wish that I had realized what the purpose of studying literature really is when I was in school.  By understanding literature written by humans, we can better study literature written by God, the Bible.  Likewise, these modern fantasy stories and their accompanying commentary should cause us to stop and think that there is greater depth to the Creator and Savior of mankind than we can imagine.  God is not boring.  He is “the most talented, most interesting, and most extraordinary person in the universe.”  He is the One who is “capable of amazing things. Because [He is] the Special.” (from The Lego Movie)

We in our fallen state are a shadow of what God intended us to be, but Jesus has made the way to restoration. What the old Levitical system and the temple can only illustrate symbolically, Jesus has made possible.

 

… in fact the ministry Jesus has received is as superior to theirs as the covenant of which He is mediator is superior to the old one, since the new covenant is established on better promises.  For if there had been nothing wrong with that first covenant, no place would have been sought for another. – Hebrews 8:6-7

 

The basis to accomplishing the requirements of the first covenant, the Old Testament covenant, was humankind’s faithfulness to God.  But, there is a flaw in the law or with the successful execution of its requirements.  The weakness is the ones who must keep the law, us.  It only takes one law or requirement for us to fall.  In the time of Adam and Eve, it was required not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  In our time, it could be the speed limit.  Of anyone who has ever driven a car, are you completely without violation of that one requirement?

 

How do the Hebrews, the Jews, know that the first covenant is not the only one and not the one by which we can be saved?  As we will see or be reminded, the Old Testament already speaks of another covenant.

 

The Old Testament law is holy and good (Romans 7:12), but it cannot make anyone right who sins by breaking it.  And, the Old Testament law cannot give the power necessary to fulfill its demands.

 

But God found fault with the people and said: “The days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah.  It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they did not remain faithful to my covenant, and I turned away from them, declares the Lord. –  Hebrews 8:8-9

 

This quotation comes from Jeremiah 31 in the Old Testament, but similar new covenant language can be found in Ezekiel 36.  So a new covenant is described twice in the Old Testament.  After the collapse of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, it was evident to all that the first covenant could not take away sin nor could the people adhere to its requirements.  It was the people of Israel who did not remain faithful.  God didn’t fail.  The people did.

 

“This is the covenant I will establish with the people of Israel after that time,” declares the Lord. “I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.  No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest.  For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.” –  Hebrews 8:10-12

 

As mentioned, this comes from Jeremiah 31, specifically verses 31-34.  Ezekiel 36:25-27 includes the promises that “I will cleanse you and you shall be clean, a new heart I will give you, I will put my Spirit in you, I will cause you to walk in my statutes.”  These words are an illustration of New Testament Christianity.  The power of the Holy Spirit bearing fruit in the followers of God.

 

In Hebrews 8:10-12, we see four things that God will do.

 

He will place an inclination in His people; God’s laws will become inner principles. 

He will have a personal relationship with each of His people, intimate fellowship.

He will be their God; sinful ignorance of God will be removed forever.

He will not remember the sins of His people; forgiveness of sin will be an everlasting reality.

 

God’s Word is so perfect.  It doesn’t say that He forgets our sins because that would not be consistent with His omniscient, all-knowing character.  Rather it says what is true.  God chooses not to remember our sins when He forgives us.

 

It is strange that I remember my sins when God does not.  Sometimes I am reminded of my past failures because of my shortcomings in the present.  Sometimes I am reminded of my failings by the disappointed looks from others.  This sort of thinking is not helpful.  In Christ, we are new creations. (II Corinthian 5:17) His mercies toward us are new every morning. (Lamentations 3:22-23).  Let us walk in newness of life in Christ. (Romans 6:4).

 

The Old Testament message is “Do this and thou shalt live.”  The requirements were written externally, on tablets of stone (Exodus 24:12, 31:18).  Now, God writes on our hearts.  I shared II Corinthians 3:2-3 at the beginning of the message.  Do you remember it?

 

You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everyone.  You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. -- II Corinthians 3:2-3

 

How could the 1^st century church thrive without the written New Testament?  The believers themselves were the letter.  Are we letting the Spirit write on us?  Are we being malleable to God’s Spirit so that He can communicate through us what He wants the people around us to see, especially the ones who don’t know Him?  The mission is not rules or disciplines.  It is to be a relationship out of which purity and faithfulness will be a natural part.

 

By calling this covenant “new,” He has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and outdated will soon disappear. –  Hebrews 8:13

 

Remember that the recipients of this letter were Hebrew or Jewish Christians who were returning to the old system which was no longer valid and therefore, no longer effective.  The message is clear.  The old covenant is obsolete.  It does not hold value to pursue it any longer.

 

The last phrase is interesting.  Did the writer anticipate the coming end of the temple worship?  Clearly, the temple worship still continued in the time that Hebrews was written.  At least a dozen places in Hebrews use the present tense when speaking of the temple.  And yet, we have the words at the end of chapter 8, the old covenant will soon disappear, and it did.

 

No Jew has offered the required sacrifices in 1,950 years.  They have disappeared.  One more reason to stand in awe of God’s Word and thank Him for the new covenant and its mediator.

 

I Timothy 2:5-6 gives us this great hope. 

 

There is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself as a ransom for all people. –  I Timothy 2:5-6

 

Let’s pray:

 

God, please cause Your Spirit to impact us freshly.  May we walk in fellowship and connection to You as You have made possible through Your Son Jesus.  We desire to know You more.  Thank You for drawing near to us.