I don’t apologize for not giving a typical Christmas message today as is the custom in many churches. Though I fully embrace the holiday and plan on celebrating the birth of Christ with my family, we are never told in scripture to celebrate the birth of Jesus. We are however, told to celebrate the Lord’s death until He comes again. And we will do that today, particularly in observing the Lord’s supper. But I hope that our continuing study in Hebrews will inform us as to why Jesus came to earth, and what He came to accomplish. Simply to celebrate His physical birth may have sentimental value, but to understand what He accomplished as our Savior through His death has eternal value.
Last week in our study we established that the church is the visible manifestation of the kingdom of God on earth. To say it another way, the kingdom of God and the church are synonymous. Thus the writer of Hebrews says to the church in chapter 12 vs 28 “Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe.”
Now the church’s service to God is what the author has been speaking so far in chapter 13. But in order to really grasp the full significance of this service, it’s necessary to understand our position in the kingdom. In the old covenant, with Israel, God initially ruled the kingdom through the priesthood as a theocracy. That was the divine plan for the government of Israel. In the new covenant, God rules the kingdom as a theocracy as well which is carried out by a new priesthood. And in that regard, the author has previously spent a great deal of time establishing that a new high priest after the order of Melchizedek has become the Great High Priest, who has offered a better sacrifice, once for all, and now sits at the right hand of God in the Holy of Holies as our Intercessor.
Now in our text we read that Jesus is our Great High Priest, who has offered Himself as the ultimate, once for all sacrifice, at an altar which was outside of Jerusalem, outside of the temple, outside of the Judaistic system. And as the eklesia, the church, the called out ones, we are to go to Him outside the camp, and like Him bear the reproach that He received, and offer to God acceptable services and sacrifices as priests to God. Not only did Christ offer a sacrifice, but we are to offer sacrifices as well. But it is within the context of a new covenant, which is not governed under the old laws and regulations of the temple which were merely a type, but we serve in a better covenant, by which we may offer up sacrifices to the Lord.
Peter spoke of this new position as the priesthood of believers in 1Peter 2:4-5 saying, “And coming to Him as to a living stone which has been rejected by men, but is choice and precious in the sight of God, you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” Peter continues in vs 9, “But you are A CHOSEN RACE, A royal PRIESTHOOD, A HOLY NATION, A PEOPLE FOR [God's] OWN POSSESSION, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.”
In that last verse, notice that there is a dual position that is assigned to us, we are a royal priesthood. That speaks of a different priesthood than the priesthood of Aaron. We are given the responsibility to rule and to reign with Christ and to serve as a priesthood unto God. So the plan of God in the new covenant is to establish the called out ones, this chosen race as Peter describes us, as priests and princes with God. We that have become saved have already been anointed to this royal priesthood. We are now receiving this kingdom, but we do not yet see it come into it’s fulfillment. The fulfillment will happen completely when we are caught up to be with the Lord at the coming of His consummation. But it is something that we already are to be in possession of, and already be serving in.
Three times this promise of our position in Christ’s kingdom has been reiterated in the book of Revelation. Listen to how John speaks of this; Rev. 1:6 “and He has made us [to be] a kingdom, priests to His God and Father--to Him [be] the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.” Rev. 5:10 "You have made them [to be] a kingdom and priests to our God; and they will reign upon the earth.” Rev. 20:6 “Blessed and holy is the one who has a part in the first resurrection; over these the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ and will reign with Him for a thousand years.”
Now this position is our inheritance, but it is also ours now. And the Lord has given the responsibility to us to serve Him now as priests unto God and to offer sacrifices. However, there is no further need for penal sacrifices for sin. That sacrifice of full atonement has been completed once for all in Christ. But there is a responsibility to offer up sacrifices which serve the kingdom of God as it is carried out on earth. However, the service we offer is not like the service of the priests in the temple. Notice in vs.10 he says, “We have an altar from which those who serve the tabernacle have no right to eat.”
What he means by that is the priests who were serving the temple under the old covenant were not qualified to serve in the new covenant. They were once useful in picturing a typology of the kingdom to come through Christ. But now there is a new administration of the kingdom of God. We have a new altar, and they serve the old altar. The new altar is the altar of the cross, whereupon Jesus offered the perfect sacrifice. There is no more need for sacrifices for sin, which were done morning and evening, day after day under the old covenant. We have no requirement, because the perfect sacrifice has been given once for all at Calvary. So consequently, there is a new priesthood, which offer different sacrifices and services in the church, which has replaced the tabernacle of the old administration.
I would just add a note here, that those who insist that the sacrifices must begin again and the temple of Jerusalem must be rebuilt in order for Christ to appear at His second coming are trusting in a flawed theology. God destroyed the temple and removed the sacrifices in 70AD as prophesied by Jesus. And if Jesus has perfected for all time the sacrifice for sin, then why would God need to resurrect the temple and sacrifices again? The whole point of the new covenant is that God has done away with the old covenantal system. To reestablish it would indicate that there was something lacking in Christ’s atonement. That cannot be.
The same principle applies to the injunctions of Jewish dietary restrictions, feast days, sabbath days, circumcision, etc. The author made the point in vs 9 that the dietary laws did not give any spiritual advantage to the Jews. Paul said if you eat meat, or if you don’t eat meat, neither will commend you to God. False teachers and especially cults always seem to want to take the church back to Jewish laws and ceremonies and rituals. But as Paul said to the Colossians in chapter 2 vs 16 “Therefore no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day-- things which are a [mere] shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ.”
So there was an old altar, an old temple, an old priesthood, and they served as a type of better things to come in Christ. But in this new covenant, we are a royal priesthood, serving a new altar which is the cross, in the new temple in which our bodies make up the greater body of Christ, which is the church, of which Christ is the head. Someone well said, “God’s head of the church is at his right hand, but His hands and feet are down here.”
Now speaking of the old altar under the old covenant, the blood of the atonement was sprinkled on the altar and the mercy seat, but the bodies of the animals were taken outside the camp and burned. Under the Jewish law, no part of the sin-offering was to be eaten, but all must be burned outside the camp. So according to that typology, the author says if they are still subject to that law, serving the old tabernacle, they cannot eat at the gospel altar; for that which is eaten there is furnished from Christ, who is the great sin offering. The Lord's supper is not our altar, but it is furnished with provision from the altar. Christ our passover is sacrificed for us (1 Co. 5:7). The Lord's supper is the feast of the gospel passover. The error of the Catholics and other so called orthodoxy, is that they crucify Christ again and again in taking the mass, thinking that eating His physical blood and flesh sanctify their bodies. But Hebrews tells us that Christ died once for all, as a final sacrifice for sin. In the Passover feast, they did not experience deliverance from death year after year, but they remembered the single event in yearly commemoration.
So the author says that Jesus in His atonement suffered outside the camp, that is outside of Jerusalem, outside of the temple, taken out of Jerusalem to the mount Golgatha. And He did so, in order to sanctify His people from their sins. And in light of our observance of Christmas, even his birth illustrated that we must go to Him outside the camp. Jesus was born not in Jerusalem, in the capital of Israel, where the leaders and the priests and the temple were, but He was born in the tiny village of Bethlehem, not in a royal palace, but in a barn, not in a crib, but in a manger. His whole life was marked by reproach, as He was contemptuously referred to as a Galilean. His life was marked by being an outsider.
So in like manner, as His select priesthood, let us go outside the camp, identifying with Him, bearing the same reproach as He bore. In other words, especially to the Hebrew audience, he was saying we must abandon the temple and the rituals and ceremonies of the old covenant and go out to the place of crucifixion, where we take up our cross and follow Him. Though we cannot offer sacrifices for sin, yet we still can offer sacrifices which are pleasing to God.
In thinking of the crucifixion and the sense of abandonment that accompanied Jesus, I am reminded of Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus who were described as secret disciples. I’m afraid that there are more than a few secret disciples of Christ in the church today as well. We are afraid to let people know that we identify with Christ. It may be socially acceptable to let people know that we are religious, to claim some measure of faith, but to actually identify with Christ and share in His reproach is something that we dare not do. And so we come short of the grace that was given to us. We come short of the purpose God has in making us a part of the royal priesthood which Peter said was given “so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.”
Instead of the church being the called out ones, the eklesia, we are too often trying to reap the benefits of this world, while claiming the benefits of the next. Like those secret disciples of Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimatha, we want to hold onto to the security and the prosperity and the pleasures of the world we live in and yet still inherit the treasures of heaven. But as Peter says, the earth is destined for destruction, and all it’s works will be burned up. 2 Peter 3:10-13 “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be burned up. Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt with intense heat! But according to His promise we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells.”
This new heaven and new earth is no less than what John calls the New Jerusalem which comes down out of heaven. The present Jerusalem, Hebrews says in vs14, is not a lasting city. In fact, just a few years after this letter Jerusalem and the temple as they knew it would be destroyed and the priesthood killed or scattered with the rest of the population. But we are looking for a new Jerusalem, a lasting city in which we shall be forever with the Lord. How foolish then it is to serve the present city, this present world, which has no lasting value. Let us go outside to join with Christ, which may cause temporary suffering, but which will result in an eternal weight of glory.
Though Him then, vs 15 says, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God. In the old covenant, thanksgiving was a form of peace offering. And in the new covenant, we may still offer a sacrifice of praise. Not by offering an animal, but by the fruit of our lips. I believe this indicates much more than offering up hymns or songs of praise, though that certainly plays a part. But I think it indicates proclaiming the wonders of His love and grace to a world in darkness. We offer praise to God to the nations of the great work of Christ in salvation. This praise is what Peter called the proclamation of the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness and into His marvelous light. The testimony which we offer to the world of God’s salvation to us is the sacrifice of praise which we offer to God. It’s the acceptable service which we render to God because He has transferred us into the kingdom of God.
To the sacrifice of praise the priests of God in the new covenant must also add the offering of works of righteousness, that which the author calls doing good. And closely aligned with that is what he calls sharing. This is the working out of brotherly love which we talked about in our earlier study. Good works do not earn our entry into the kingdom of God, but as priests of God we serve the body of God through good works. Paul said in Eph. 2:10 “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.” So we were created in righteousness so that we might walk in good works, even as Christ did on earth.
So also Paul said to Timothy to instruct the church to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share.” [1Tim. 6:18] Sharing is a part of good works, and when it is offered up in the name of the Lord, it is a sacrifice with which God is well pleased. Sharing is speaking of those who according to Paul are rich in this world’s goods, that they should share with those in need. James says the same thing, James 2:14-17 “What use is it, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but he has no works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, and one of you says to them, "Go in peace, be warmed and be filled," and yet you do not give them what is necessary for [their] body, what use is that? Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead, [being] by itself.”
And Paul, speaking to the Philippians is even more explicit saying that the financial gifts and offerings he received from them was “an acceptable sacrifice, well pleasing to God”, using almost identical language to our text in vs 16.
This sacrifice of sharing in financial means brings the author back to the subject of leaders in the church, who are worthy not only of support, but a certain measure of honor, requiring the sacrifice of our submission. Vs. 17, “Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they keep watch over your souls as those who will give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with grief, for this would be unprofitable for you.”
Now he has already clarified the fact that worthy leaders are those who preach the word to you, back in vs.7. “Remember those who led you, who spoke the word of God to you; and considering the result of their conduct, imitate their faith.” Now to the injunction to remember them, and to imitate them, comes even more explicit commands to submit to them, and obey them, being understood that is contingent upon their faithfulness to the word of God.
In the story of Christ’s birth, the gospel of Luke records that there were shepherd in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks by night. And that same word picture is used here to describe the under shepherds who keep watch over the souls of the flock in their charge. It indicates a sleepless state of watching, or more expressly, that of being on the alert on behalf of their flock. Pastors, or shepherds, are responsible for the souls of their sheep, to guard them against the schemes and deceit of the devil, the false teachings, wolves in sheep’s clothing.
And the author encourages us to follow their guidance, so that the pastor may not suffer that stricter judgement that will come to teachers of the gospel, and that you may not live an unprofitable life.
There is a profit to living godly. Paul said in 1Tim. 6:6 that “godliness [actually] is a means of great gain when accompanied by contentment.” And contentment is found in submission to the authority that God has established for our benefit. Contentment is also found in doing the will of God, doing the things which are pleasing to God. Contentment is found in performing our service to God in the role that He has prepared us for. And God has prepared us to be a royal priesthood, proclaiming the excellencies of Him who has called us out of the kingdom of darkness into His marvelous light. Let us do so with praise, with service, and through sharing, being subject to the authority of the church of God and His shepherds, that we may fulfill the measure of grace that was given to us.
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