The Christadelphian May 1912, W.H. Boulton

“The Epistle to the Hebrews XIV”

The Will of God.—Ears digged and a Body prepared.—The Plan of Salvation through Christ.—Exhortations

HAVING considered the first of the points which are referred to in connection with the “better sacrifices” of the New Covenant, and having seen thereby that in the saying that “he put away sin by the sacrifice of himself,” there is a reality which is not perceived in the religious systems of the apostacy, we must now pass to the second statement which was set out in the previous chapter.

2. In the offering of himself Jesus established the will of God. That sacrifice in itself was not sufficient to take away sin and ensure acceptance by God had long been taught in Israel. Prophets and psalmist combine to declare this very clearly. “To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? saith the Lord: I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he-goats” (Isa. 1:11). “I desired mercy, and not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings” (Hosea 6:6). “Thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it; thou delightest not in burnt offering” (Psa. 51:16). Something more was necessary, and such a conclusion was the more inevitable when it was remembered that all the cattle upon a thousand hills belonged to God. How could the mere death and burning of them be supposed to give satisfaction to their Owner? “A broken spirit,” “a broken and a contrite heart,” were the expressions used by the psalmist to define what was needful; “doing justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly with God” were the essentials declared by the prophet.

Such expressions could not be applied to the sacrifices of the law. The worshippers were often characterised by such feelings and actions, but the sacrifices never. Yet those worshippers also recognised, in the words of the Psalmist, that none could redeem his brother or provide the necessary redemption; therefore, the conclusion was irresistible that some far better sacrifice was required. In reference thereto the psalmist further wrote, as quoted in Hebrews, and in illustration of the proposition set out above, “Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me. In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou hast had no pleasure. Then said I, Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me) to do thy will, O God.” That was what was needed; the law could not provide a fulfilment, but the doctrines of Christianity pointed to such an one, for they circled around one who was implicitly obedient to the will of God, although partaker of flesh and blood as already indicated.

There is a peculiar variation in the wording of the quotation compared with what we read in the psalm from which it is taken. Instead of “A body hast thou prepared me,” we there read “Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire; mine ears hast thou opened (or as the margin renders it—digged).” Digged ears, for the proper meaning of the Hebrew is clearly to dig, is a remarkable expression which has given rise to much discussion amongst commentators. Yet the use made of it in Hebrews is clearly explanatory. Ears digged are ears opened, and thereby prepared to receive the intended instruction, which was to be heard. In scriptural usage to hear is to profit by the words spoken. Thus Samuel said to Saul, “Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold to obey is better than sacrifice and to hearken than the fat of rams” (1 Sam. 15:22). The parallelism involves that hearing and obeying have identical meanings. The “body prepared” was accordingly a “body” ready to hear and to do the will of God. “My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me, and to finish His work” (Jno. 4:34). “Being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross” (Phil. 2:8). Thus in Jesus of Nazareth the two-fold conditions of an acceptable sacrifice were combined. He was the sinless bearer of the sinful nature, a perfectly innocent member of a sinful race, in whose death God condemned sin in the flesh, at the same time declaring His own righteousness, and whose faithfulness to the divine commandments ensured a resurrection from the dead, so that being delivered for our offences he was raised again for our justification.

A recognition of these two principles enables us to recognise the reasons why the sacrifice whereby the “blood of the (New) Covenant” was shed was superior to all those of the old dispensation. It also enables us to understand the true meaning of many expressions in the Hebrews which are stumbling blocks to orthodox communities. It is said for example, “Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building, neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood, he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption” (Heb. 9:11–12). How much this passage is misunderstood is evidenced by the addition of the words “for us.” But the passage implies that he obtained it for himself. That he needed it is evidenced by another saying. “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 . . . and being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him” (Heb. 5:7, 9). He was “brought again from the dead through the blood of the everlasting covenant” (Heb. 13:20). The types connected with the first covenant set forth this fact in many ways. The “patterns of things in the heavens” needed to be purified; the tabernacle, and even the altar itself, were purified by the sprinkled blood of the sacrifices, and so “the heavenly things themselves” (including the altar—Heb. 13:10) were “purified” with better sacrifices than these when “he put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.” “Such a high priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens; who needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for the people’s; for this he did once when he offered up himself” (Heb. 7:26, 27).

The teaching of these testimonies is most important. It was not as a substitute that Jesus died; God’s plan knows nothing of such an idea; he was a representative, a prospective federal head. As death passed upon all men because their first progenitor was a sinner who earned the wages of sin, and they thereby die in him (1 Cor. 15:22)—for they are by nature “in him”—so life eternal may be obtained by all who become “the children” (Heb. 2:13), by being baptised into him (Gal. 3:27), who “loved righteousness and hated iniquity,” and who thereafter “abide in him.” To such he says, as to his disciples long ago, “Because I live ye shall live also.” “As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.” Such teaching is beautiful, and reflective of the glory of the great Creator who arranged such a wondrous plan of salvation. That plan may be summed up in a few sentences:—Christ as a member of a race condemned to death, died under that condemnation. Being perfectly righteous he was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father. The sin-nature having been destroyed, and Jesus having attained unto life and immortality, can bestow the same gift upon others who come to him in the appointed way. Coming thus to him they are united to him, and if faithful to the end will receive the gift of eternal life by a physical deliverance from the power of sin and death.

It will be observed that the ceremonies to which attention is drawn in the contrasts under notice relate to the day of atonement, the day of the Jewish year. On that day, after the appointed sacrifices were offered, the High Priest went into the Most Holy with the blood of the offerings, to present it there as an atonement. This is the point emphasised in the epistle. “For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh; how much more shall the blood of Christ, who, through the eternal spirit, offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?” (Heb. 9:13, 14). “This man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins, for ever sat down on the right hand of God . . . for by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified” (Heb. 10:12, 14).

This is the consummation of the argument concerning the better sacrifice; and it is the same point as was in view at the commencement of the reasoning relative to the covenants. It is summed up as follows:—“Whereof the Holy Spirit also is a witness to us; for after that he had said before, This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord: I will put my laws in their hearts, and in their minds will I write them; and their sins and iniquities will I remember no more. Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin” (Heb. 10:15–18).

The exhortations with which this section of the epistle closes are intimately connected with the matters which we have considered. The “newly slain yet living way,” opened up by the High Priest over the house of God, is to give boldness (margin, liberty) to enter into the holiest. Therefore, “let us draw near with a true heart, in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.” In so doing we are to “consider one another to provoke unto love and good works: not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together.” The appropriateness of the exhortation will be realised when it is remembered that the assembling together is for the purpose of partaking of the covenant meal—that which symbolises the “body prepared,” and the blood of the new covenant. Such expressions take a deeper and more impressive meaning when they are thus associated with the reasonings out of which they were developed.

The other side of the matter is exhibited in the same connection when reference is made to wilful sins on the part of those who had entered into the bonds of the covenant. As the law of Moses could not be trifled with without grave risk to the trifler, so in the case of the new covenant. Treading under foot the Son of God, esteeming as unholy the blood of the covenant whereby sanctification was obtained, are courses which no one can view without feeling how heinous they must be in the sight of God. Alas, for those who have acted! All joy to those who can apply to themselves the closing words of the chapter under notice “But we are not of them that draw back unto perdition, but of them that believe to the saving of the soul.”

W. H. Boulton.