A Series of Lessons

On The

Book of Hebrews
Volume Two

Given by
CHARLES R. RODMAN
In 1942

Published by
The Apostolic Faith
6615 SE 52nd AVE
Portland, Oregon 97206
 Contents
TOPIC PAGE

God’s Covenant with Israel ………………………………….…… 1

Law Instituted for the Jews ………………………………………..5

The Tabernacle . …………………………………………………...18

The Importance of the Atonement..……………………….……...30

The Doctrine of Sanctification Explained.....……………….…… 43

Presumptuous Sin………………………………………………… 55

Old Testament Feasts ……………………………………………. 60

The Over-All Plan of Atonement ………………………………… 69

Roll Call of the Heroes of Faith …………………………… …..... 76

“By Faith”..………………………………………………………..… 86

Roll Call of Heroes Continued ......…………………………..….…97

 God’s Covenant with Israel
___Lesson Eleven___

God made great and far-reaching promises to Abraham before the Law
was ever given. It is an erroneous idea that the Law was a substitute for the
Abrahamic covenant, the promise of the Gospel period. That was ordained in the
plan of God before the Law, here called the “first covenant,” was ever given.
Let us turn to Deuteronomy 5 where Moses reviews the Law in his
address to Israel:
“The LORD our God made a covenant with us in Horeb [Sinai].
“The LORD made not this covenant with our fathers, but with us,
even us, who are all of us here alive this day” (Deuteronomy 5:2, 3).
He had made a covenant with the fathers, that other covenant which was
made with Abraham, and was confirmed with an oath. Here Moses is speaking of
a covenant that was made specifically with the Israelites, which included the Ten
Commandments written upon two tables of stone; the ceremonial law (all that is
found in Leviticus and much that is found in Exodus); and their civil laws, their
relation one with another when they should come into the Promised Land. They
were like the statutes which are upon law books of Oregon for governing the
relation of man with man. The mode of worship was embraced in the ceremonial
law. It embraced all that was given them when they came to Mount Sinai.
A covenant is an agreement between two parties. One of the parties was
God Himself and the other the Children of Israel. What was the agreement
between God and the people of Israel? That they should do what God had
commanded at Sinai, and carry it out. If they would do that, God had certain
things that He would do for them: He would bring them into the Promised Land
and He would prosper them there and bless them, multiply them, and make them
a blessing unto others as He had promised Abraham.
The Law is sometimes called the Old Covenant. It is divided into the
ceremonial, the moral, and the civil laws. But we do not find any such divisions in
the Word of God. When we find reference to the Law, all the Law as a whole is
meant, unless it is otherwise specified in Scripture. When a reference is made to
the Law — as when Jesus speaks of the Law or speaks of the writings of Moses
— He means all of it as was given here at Mount Sinai and was amplified and
enlarged upon and preached by the prophets. That embraces the whole of the
Old Testament. That was called the Law.
The Jews today divide the Old Testament into three parts: the Law, the
Prophets, and what they call the Writings. The Writings embrace the historical
portions and some poetic portions of the Bible.

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Mediator of Better Covenant
Jesus is the Mediator of a better Covenant, which is established upon
better promises. Those promises we found out were given to Abraham, then
repeated and enlarged upon from time to time. The promise to Abraham that in
his seed should all the nations of the earth be blessed, when rounded out in
Scripture and developed to its full limit, constituted Jesus Christ, the Gospel. It
was established on better promises than was given to the Israelites in the Law.
The promise to the Israelites was that they would be brought into the
Promised Land; that they would be victors over their enemies; that that land
should be theirs (and the bounds of it were given); that the Lord would bless and
increase them, and they would become a great nation — which for a limited time
they were.
The promises under the Old Covenant were largely material blessings that
would be theirs in the land of Canaan. The blessings which accrued under the
promises of the New Covenant were spiritual and heavenly. We may say that the
promises of the New Covenant are as much better as the Covenant itself is
better than the Old Covenant.
Now that being the case, you can begin to see what the promises of God
are in this dispensation. Here was the Priesthood under Christ exalted far above
everything that was found in the Levitical order. The Tabernacle itself was a very
small shadow of the true Tabernacle in Heaven. That is how much better the
promises are in the Covenant into which you and I are brought.
“For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place
have been sought for the second” (Hebrews 8:7).
Are we to understand by that that the Law, here called the “first covenant,”
had flaws in it? No. We cannot reconcile that with what the Psalmist said; for he
said, “The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul” (Psalm 19:7). It was
perfect for the mission that it was to fulfill; but it was not the limit of God’s plan. It
was not embracive or comprehensive enough. Therefore, it was, as it were, a
little circle within a great circle.
Theoretically a circle is absolutely perfect — there is not a flaw in it. Every
point on the circumference of that circle is an equal distance from the center. But
here we have a very little circle within a great circle. They are both circular, but
the little circle is smaller than the great circle. If it had been adequate, there
would have been no place for the second circle.
“For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith
the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with
the house of Judah:
“Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the
day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt;
because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith
the Lord” (Hebrews 8:8, 9). (Paul is quoting from Jeremiah 31:31, 32.)

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 That was the covenant made on Mount Sinai with their fathers, a covenant
which they did not keep. After promising to do all that the Lord commanded them,
when Moses remained in the Mount for forty days they made the golden calf and
bowed down to it, saying: “These be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up
out of the land of Egypt” (Exodus 32:4).
After God gave the Law, He instituted the Levitical priesthood and the
whole order of sacrifices and offerings, because the Law itself revealed the
necessity of this second arrangement.
When the Lord laid down the Ten Commandments and the entire moral
code which goes with it, it was to reveal to the Israelites the impossibility of their
measuring up to it in their own strength. Therefore the Levitical priesthood
ordained sacrifices and offerings to make provision for them, because of what the
Law could not do. The Levitical priesthood only pointed on to the great provision
which God had made, Jesus and His plan of salvation.

Reason for Israel’s Failure

Did not Israel fail in the thing because they did not let God write the Law
on their hearts? That was the final reason. We see that from what Jeremiah has
to say. We are not to understand that there was no such thing as real salvation
under the Old Covenant. Even before the Law was ever given they had it.
Abraham had real salvation. The Word says that he believed God, and it was
counted unto him for righteousness. Therefore it was possible to attain salvation,
just as it is in your day and mine under the present Covenant. But at the same
time, Abraham did not come without an offering.
The first thing Abraham did when he came into the land of Canaan was to
erect an altar unto the Lord and offer sacrifices. Every time he returned to the
land of Canaan after an absence, the first place to which he went was Bethel
where he made an offering unto the Lord.
But the thing was this: instead of the Israelites as a whole conforming to
the plan that God had laid down, they failed completely, and did not have those
experiences within their hearts. They disobeyed His laws, went into idolatry,
forsook His covenant; and therefore God was released from keeping His part of
the promises.
If one party to a covenant breaks his promise, that releases the other
party. If I go into a contract with a brother to build a house for me and I fail in
making my payment at the time the contract calls for it, does not that release the
brother from any further obligation to me?
In that way Israel had broken their covenants, and that absolved God from
fulfilling His part of it. But God had made ample provision whereby they might
have salvation if they wanted it, might enjoy communion with God and have the
experiences the same as we have today, with the exception of the baptism of the
Holy Ghost. And even that was given after a fashion in the case of Elisha

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following Elijah. They were anointed for certain missions. The Spirit came upon
them. That was a type, in those days, of the baptism of the Holy Ghost.
They had justification and sanctification, and that is in evidence throughout
many parts of the Old Testament, especially in the Psalms. Read the 51st Psalm,
which is David’s prayer of repentance, and you will find that he prayed for
cleansing, which is sanctification.
Therefore the fault in the final analysis was with the House of Judah and
the House of Israel and not with God’s provision, although it was not up to the
heights and lengths and breadths that the Covenant of our day reaches.
“Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the
day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt;
because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith
the Lord” (Hebrews 8:9).
This is just an enlargement of the promise that was made to Abraham.
The very fact that men like Abraham, Job, Noah, Enoch, David and other godly
men down the line walked in His commandments and ordinances and kept them,
was an indication that the rest of Israel could have done it. There was no fault in
that Old Covenant in any way, in any of its provisions.
“I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and
I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people” (Hebrews 8:10).
This was what God might have done for Israel, but when they drew back
He wrote the Law upon tables of stone. Under the New Covenant He promises to
write it upon the heart. How about the tables of stone? They are not necessary
any longer. Paul brings out that very thing. We find in II Corinthians 3:7-11:
“But if the ministration of death, written and engraven in stones, was
glorious, [We only have to read the description there of how God came
down upon the Mount and how the Children of Israel trembled, to see how
glorious it was.] . . . which glory was to be done away:
“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.”
Therefore when the Law is written upon the fleshly tables of our heart,
even the moral Law as it was written upon tables of stone under the Old
Testament is dispensed with.

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Worshiping God in Spirit
“And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man
his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to
the greatest” (Hebrews 8:11).
This has reference to the dissemination of the Gospel, to the carrying it
out into all the world. In Jesus’ conversation with the woman at the well, He said,
“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
4:23). Not in the Temple at Jerusalem, but the true worshippers shall worship
Him in spirit and in truth, irrespective of place. They will no longer be bound by a
temple, a Levitical priesthood; they will no longer be limited by prescribed
measures of the Law; but bursting all these bonds, the Gospel shall extend not
only to the Israelites but shall be given to all nations.
Moses commanded the Israelites to instruct their children in the Law. They
were to tell the commandments to their children and to their children’s children.
And then they had the prophets who, to a limited extent, taught the Law. But they
did not have the means for spreading the Law as exists in our day when
everyone has had an opportunity to hear about the Lord and His plan of
redemption through Jesus Christ. We are living in that glorious day in which the
Gospel is carried out to every kindred, nation and tongue.

Law Instituted for the Jews

___Lesson Twelve___

The Law for Israel Alone

The substance of the next two chapters concerns the Tabernacle and Its
furnishings. It will be of help to visualize the Tabernacle as we study these
chapters.
The Law filled in the period between the promise to Abraham and his son,
and the fulfillment of that promise. The Law was given and executed during that
period. The Law was given at the time that Israel was called out of Egypt, and the
whole Mosaic economy was for Jews exclusively. There is no record that the
Mosaic law was ever imposed upon a Gentile nation or was even suggested as
being for them. The Gentile nations were only remotely concerned in the matter.
God confined His dealings almost exclusively to the Jews throughout the entire
period.

“The LORD our God made a covenant with us in Horeb.

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 “The LORD made not this covenant with our fathers, but with us,
even us, who are all of us here alive this day” (Deuteronomy 5:2, 3).
That implies that the Covenant made at Sinai was for them and for them
exclusively. It was so momentous to the Jewish nation that a new calendar was
issued at that time. The Passover, one of the provisions of this Law, dated the
beginning of their year. This was to be the first month, Abib. And even their
commandments, the Decalogue, were given on the basis of their deliverance out
of Egypt. That deliverance was the great theme of the nation.
All God’s dealings with the Israelites took their orientation from that great
event: their deliverance from Egyptian bondage. More than that, many of their
laws were of such a nature as to be applicable only to the Jews or nations
dwelling in that particular area. Their feasts and sabbaths were all governed by
the seasons peculiar to Palestine. For instance: at the Passover were made the
offerings of the first fruits. That meant that the season was such that the barley
harvest came about at that time, and the offering was made unto the Lord. If the
Law were intended for other nations, they would either have to live in the
northern hemisphere where the seasons are the same as provided by the Law,
or move into areas where the climatic conditions were the same as in Palestine,
or they could not have observed the Law.
There were many other provisions which indicate that it was for the Jews
alone, and therefore temporary. When the Jews were dispersed, and no longer
existed as a nation, the Law had served its purpose. Some Jews had gone back
to Judea after the dispersion, and at the time of Christ were trying to observe the
Law. Jesus said: “The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the
kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it” Luke 16:16).
In Hebrews 9:10 we read in regard to the Tabernacle:
“Which stood only in meats and drinks, and divers washings, and
carnal ordinances, imposed on them until the time of reformation.”
The time of reformation was the Gospel period. That reminds us of
another verse, in Acts 3:21, where Peter was preaching on the Day of Pentecost.
Speaking of Christ he said:
“Whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all
things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since
the world began.”
Those words “reformation” and “restitution” are practically synonymous.
From the period of the Law we come up one step to the Gospel, the time of
reformation. Peter implies that with the coming of the Lord, the Heavens must
receive Him until the time of the restitution of all things. That is the plan on which
God works throughout the ages, stepping nearer and nearer to perfection.

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Law Added Because of Transgressions
This leads us, then, to ask the question: What place, if any, has the Law in
the Gospel dispensation? Paul asked that same question in Galatians 3:19:
“Wherefore then serveth the law?”
He then answers: “It was added because of transgressions, till the seed
should come to whom the promise was made.”
It was added because of transgressions. The Gospel was already
preached in Abraham’s time. In fact, the law, “The just shall live by faith,” was
from the beginning. “By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice
than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous” (Hebrews 11:4).
Abel was justified by faith; Enoch was justified by faith. It was by faith that Noah
prepared the ark, “and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith”
(Hebrews 11:7). The everlasting covenant God made with Abraham was also
righteousness by faith. “Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for
righteousness” (Romans 4:3). That belief was in Jesus. Jesus said: “Your father
Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad” (John 8:56). Paul
said: “For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: . . . “ (Hebrews
4:2). The Gospel was preached to them.
If people were justified by faith in those early days, the same as we are
now under the never-changing covenant made with Abraham, why was the Law
added? The hearts of the people had become hardened by sin until they needed
something visual. They needed props in their worship. And all “props,” all the
sacrifices, the Tabernacle service, prefigured Jesus. The Law was a “figure for
the time then present, . . . until the time of reformation” (Hebrews 9:9, 10). It was
an accommodation until Jesus should come.
If the Ten Commandments in their Old Testament form passed away
(which we found they did because the Law written on stones was done away)
Paul asks what have we to take its place? We will find every one of the moral
principles which are enunciated in the Ten Commandments reaffirmed in the
New Testament. (The Apostolic Faith tract No. 94 gives the Old and the New
covenants in parallel columns.)

Knowledge of Sin
The Law, being a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ, illustrates and gives
us a better understanding of the New Covenant. We have a remarkable instance
in the New Testament of how a man is led to a knowledge of sin by the Law. That
is Paul’s own experience which he gives in the 7th chapter of Romans.
“What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not
known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had
said, Thou shalt not covet.

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 “But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all
manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead”
(Romans 7:7, 8).
That is, he had no knowledge of it; he was ignorant of it.
“For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment
came, sin revived, and I died” (Romans 7:9).
In other words, the Law brings us to a knowledge of sin. And with a
knowledge that we are breaking the Law of God there comes spiritual death.
“And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be
unto death.
“For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by
it slew me.
“Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just,
and good.
“Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But
sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good;
that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful”
(Romans 7:10-13).
It is the Law that brings out the sinfulness of sin. Conviction shows men
where they stand before God, their utterly lost and undone condition under the
Law.
“For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.
“For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but
what I hate, that do I.
“If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is
good.
“Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
“For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing:
for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find
not.
“For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not,
that I do” (Romans 7:14-19).
Here he is speaking of the conflict that is going on in the life of a sinner
who, like Paul, is thoroughly familiar with the Law and knows that every day he
lives he is breaking that Law. Yet he is conscious that another nature is
constantly prompting him against that, but he finds no ability within himself to do
what the Law commands. That is a miserable life.
“Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that
dwelleth in me” (Romans 7:20).

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 But that did not excuse Paul at all; it does not excuse any sinner. His
“helplessness” is not going to stand him in hand, because God has provided a
deliverance out of that condition. If he does not take advantage of the provision
which God has made, then who is to blame? The sinner.
It is bad enough to be a sinner, to be bound by some awful nature that is
constantly making him break the Law of God; but it is a thousand times worse
when that sinner comes to a knowledge of a way out of that condition, through
the Spirit of God, and then refuses to take it, or neglects to take it.
“For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing:
for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find
not” (Romans 7:18).
I dare say that every one of us knows what Paul is talking about here.
“For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not,
that I do.
“Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that
dwelleth in me.
“I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.
“For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
“But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my
mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my
members.
“O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of
this death?” (Romans 7:19 - 24).
He cries out in his despair for deliverance from that condition. Under the
Law, the lash was over him. He was scourged under it. He finally reached the
place where he was breathing out threatenings and slaughter; he had reached
the limit. All his resources were exhausted, and he had come to the end of his
rope when Christ stepped in. The Law had revealed sin, but Christ brought
deliverance from sin.
Paul had been zealous in keeping the Law. He said concerning the
righteousness which is in the Law, he was “blameless.” He had failed to see
Jesus in keeping the Law; but he had an experience on the Damascus road that
changed it all. There he met Jesus; and from then on his desire was to “be found
in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is
through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith”
(Philippians 3:9).
“I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I
myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin”
(Romans 7:25).

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Then he begins the 8th chapter with:
“There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ
Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.”
How about the man who has reached that place where he has passed out
from under that condemnation and is walking with Christ? Is the Law operative
there? He is dead to it; the Law is dead to him.
You might ask: How about the man who never had any light on the Law of
God, as the heathen? There are plenty of them in our own land. We do not have
to go across the waters to find them. The Bible takes that class in, too, as is
found in Romans 2:
“For as many as have sinned without law shall also perish without
law: and as many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law;
“(For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of
the law shall be justified.
“For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the
things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto
themselves:
“Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their
conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while
accusing or else excusing one another;)” (Romans 2:12-15).
Whether a man has the knowledge of the Law or not, he certainly has that
Law of God in his conscience; and he will be judged anyway.
“Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is
risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh
intercession for us” (Romans 8:34).
It is not Christ who condemns.
“Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father: there is one that
accuseth you, even Moses, in whom ye trust” (John 5:45).
The Pharisees professed a belief in Moses. They had before them
constantly that which did accuse them, and that was the Law of Moses.
Therefore that answers Paul’s question: “Who is he that condemneth?” It is
Moses.

The Words of Jesus

Christ said in John 12:47, 48:
“And if any man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not: for
I came not to judge the world, but to save the world.

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 “He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that
judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the
last day.”
“The word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.”
For instance, concerning the law of marriage, Jesus asked: “What did Moses
command you?”
“And they said, Moses suffered to write a bill of divorcement, and to
put her away.
“And Jesus answered and said unto them, For the hardness of your
heart he wrote you this precept.
“But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and
female.
“For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave
to his wife;
“And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain,
but one flesh.
“What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. . .
“. . . Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another,
committeth adultery against her.
“And if a woman shall put away her husband, and be married to
another, she committeth adultery” (Mark 10:4-12).
Those are the words (the words of Jesus) that will judge man in the last
day.
Concerning murder, the Law said:
“Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the
judgment:
“But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother
without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment” (Matthew 5:21, 22).
A man may live all his life without committing murder, thus obeying the
Law in that point, but if he has hatred in his heart, the words of Jesus will judge
him in the last day and condemn him to hell.
When Jesus speaks of the word that He has spoken He has reference to
more than just that which concerned His ministry; it is the entire Word of God.
That is what the man who has refused Jesus Christ, rejected Him, and has not
received His Word here is to be judged by. Jesus said that Word will meet him in
the last day.

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 What is the office of the Holy Ghost? We are given that in John 16:
“Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go
away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I
depart, I will send him unto you.
“And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of
righteousness, and of judgment” (John 16:7, 8).
“Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into
all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; . . . He shall glorify me”
(John 16:13, 14).
In other words, the Holy Ghost will take the Word and apply it to the heart,
and thus He will reprove of sin. He will also, through the Word, manifest the
righteousness of God which is the standard God maintains. Thus He will convict
of righteousness and of the penalty awaiting the man who does not measure up
to that righteousness, thus revealing judgment. Jesus said: “The Father judgeth
no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son” (John 5:22). There you
have the office of Christ and the office of the Holy Ghost.
We might turn again to Galatians and read the remainder of that. He likens
the Law unto a schoolmaster.
“But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by
faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe.
“But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the
faith which should afterwards be revealed.
“Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ,
that we might be justified by faith.
“But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster.
“For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.
“For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on
Christ.
“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there
is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.
“And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs
according to the promise” (Galatians 3:22-29).
This is a beautiful description he has brought out: the release from the
bondage of the Law, and being under the tutelage of the schoolmaster. We read
in John 1:17:
“For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus
Christ.”
The words of the Law bring death; but Jesus said, “The words that I speak
unto you, they are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63). That is the difference
between the two messages.

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 The law is for the lawless, Paul said. That means not only our civil laws
but also the laws of God for those who break the law. Therefore, the man who is
breaking the law is under the law, he is subject to it; but when he has this
deliverance and is no more a lawbreaker, where can the law have any hold upon
that man? When he is living by faith in Christ Jesus he is no longer a lawbreaker.
Paul sets that forth very distinctly in Romans 8:3-5:
“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.
“For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but
they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.”
There you have the fulfillment of the Law by him that is under Grace; so
the righteousness of Jesus Christ is more than imputed. “Imputation” means it is
placed to our credit without our actually having it. Paul says here that “the law
might be fulfilled.” That is, that we actually have the righteousness of Jesus
Christ, that we keep the commandments of God.
How is that brought about? By the Spirit of righteousness that is put within
us when we are born again enabling us to obey that Law, which was absolutely
impossible as long as we were carnal and sold under sin.
In the nominal church there has been too much stress upon the im-
putation and not enough upon the fulfillment of the righteousness. We thank God
for a plan that God had ordained by which that righteousness may be fulfilled.
Paul said in another place that instead of Grace setting aside the Law, it
establishes the Law; Jesus fulfilled all the Old Testament types, establishing
them as the truth, proving that they spoke of Him, instead of Jesus contradicting
the Law and destroying it, as they charged. Jesus Himself said: “For the Son of
man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them” (Luke 9:56). And He
did. By the Spirit of Jesus Christ which comes into the believer’s heart He also
fulfills it.
“Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am
not come to destroy, but to fulfil.
“For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one
tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled”
(Mathew 5:17, 18).

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The Earthly Sanctuary
Now turn to Hebrews 9:
“Then verily the first covenant had also ordinances of divine service,
and a worldly sanctuary.”
That means an earthly sanctuary in contrast with that sanctuary which he
spoke of in the previous chapter which was the true Tabernacle not pitched by
man but by God.
“For there was a tabernacle made; the first, wherein was the
candlestick, and the table, and the shewbread; which is called the
sanctuary.
“And after the second veil, . . .
It will help to look at the plan of the Tabernacle on page 109. You will
notice at the entrance of the Tabernacle a dotted line indicates the first veil, or
court. That was the covering of the Tabernacle. It was made long and lapped
over, which formed a curtain to its entrance. That was the first veil. The second
veil is the second dotted line before the Holy of Holies.
“And after the second veil, the tabernacle which is called the Holiest
of all;
“Which had the golden censer, and the ark of the covenant overlaid
round about with gold, wherein was the golden pot that had manna, and
Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tables of the covenant;
“And over it the cherubims of glory shadowing the mercyseat; of
which we cannot now speak particularly.”
We cannot help but wish that he had spoken particularly; but we will try to
go a little into detail about the Tabernacle. The command concerning the
Tabernacle is given in Exodus 25. Bear in mind all the time we are studying the
Tabernacle that we are studying a plan of heavenly things, as we found in our
previous lesson. This is given us here of what is in Heaven. That ought to cause
us to approach the matter with reverence, and feel that we are treading on holy
ground, as we read this remarkable account. We will read a few verses in
Exodus:
“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” (Exodus 24:3).
These words had already been given and that was the Law — the Ten
Commandments with all the ordinances, not only the ceremonial ordinances, but
all the civil ordinances concerning their conduct in the land of promise when they
came into it.

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 “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 24:4-8).
He had already received the moral and civil law; he had written it in a
book. That was God’s side of the covenant; now here is Israel’s side, when they
agreed to keep it. Thus it is dedicated with the blood. The Law was given before
any commandment was given concerning the Tabernacle. Thus the Tabernacle
is given as an injunction to the Law. It was necessary for the execution of the
Law, in order that the Law might be carried out, as we will see in going into the
study.
“Then went up Moses. and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of
the elders of Israel:
“And they saw the God of Israel: and there was under his feet as it
were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of heaven
in his clearness” (Exodus 24:9, 10).
Is not that remarkably like what John the Beloved saw when he was in
exile on the Isle of Patmos? He saw the Lord enthroned there. Here Moses and
those who are with him have a vision of the true Tabernacle, of the heavenly one;
thus they have that for the pattern in the making of this Tabernacle that they were
to establish upon earth. In Exodus 25:40 we read:
“And look that thou make them after their pattern, which was shewed
thee in the mount.”
All had been done according to that pattern.
“And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them.
“According to all that I shew thee, after the pattern of the tabernacle,
and the pattern of all the instruments thereof, even so shall ye make it”
(Exodus 25:8, 9).
Explicit instructions were given as to the dimensions: the height, length,
breadth and all the furnishings for it.

15
 The Tabernacle proper stood in the court as you will see indicated. It was
10 cubits wide, 30 cubits long and divided into two compartments: the first one
was called the holy place, which is 10 x 20 cubits, leaving the second place 10
cubits square, it was also 10 cubits high — a perfect cube in form.
Round about this was a court. This was 50 cubits wide by 100 cubits long.
A cubit is approximately a foot and a half. That would make the entire enclosure
about 75 feet wide and 150 feet long. After Moses had received the implicit
instructions for the Tabernacle, the furnishings, and the clothing for the priests
and their anointing, the Word states:
“Thus did Moses: according to all that the LORD commanded him,
so did he.
“And it came to pass in the first month in the second year, on the
first day of the month, . . . “ (Exodus 40:16, 17).
This is the second year after their departure out of Egypt, and the first
month, which would be Abib. This was on the first day of the month, fifteen days
before the Passover.
“. . .that the tabernacle was reared up.
“And Moses reared up the tabernacle, and fastened his sockets, and
set up the boards thereof, and put in the bars thereof, and reared up his
pillars.
“And he spread abroad the tent over the tabernacle, and put the
covering of the tent above upon it; as the LORD commanded Moses.
“And he took and put the testimony into the ark, and set the staves
on the ark, and put the mercy seat above upon the ark:
“And he brought the ark into the tabernacle, and set up the vail of the
covering, and covered the ark of the testimony; as the LORD commanded
Moses.
“And he put the table in the tent of the congregation, upon the side
of the tabernacle northward, without the vail” (Exodus 40:17-22).
The entrance to the Tabernacle is east. It was always set up with the
entrance eastward. That would make the north to the right hand, the south to the
left hand.
“And he lighted the lamps before the LORD; as the LORD
commanded Moses.
“And he put the golden altar in the tent of the congregation before
the vail:
“And he burnt sweet incense thereon; as the LORD commanded
Moses.
“And he set up the hanging at the door of the tabernacle.

16
 “And he put the altar of burnt offering by the door of the tabernacle
of the tent of the congregation, and offered upon it the burnt offering and
the meat offering; as the LORD commanded Moses.
“And he set the laver between the tent of the congregation and the
altar, and put water there, to wash withal.
“And Moses and Aaron and his sons washed their hands and their
feet thereat:
“When they went into the tent of the congregation, and when they
came near unto the altar, they washed; as the LORD commanded Moses.
“And he reared up the court round about the tabernacle and the altar,
and set up the hanging of the court gate. So Moses finished the work.
“Then a cloud covered the tent of the congregation, and the glory of
the LORD filled the tabernacle.
“And Moses was not able to enter into the tent of the congregation,
because the cloud abode thereon, and the glory of the LORD filled the
tabernacle.
“And when the cloud was taken up from over the tabernacle, the
children of Israel went onward in all their journeys:
“But if the cloud were not taken up, then they journeyed not till the
day that it was taken up.
“For the cloud of the LORD was upon the tabernacle by day, and fire
was on it by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel, throughout all their
journeys” (Exodus 40:25-38).

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 EPHRAIM
MANASSEH
BENJAMIN }
Levites

{ REUBEN
SIMEON
GAD
Levites
T
A
B
DAN
ASHER
}
NAPHTALI

Levites
E
R
N
A
C
L
W E

N Moses, Aaron
S and Priests

E
JUDAH
ISSACHAR
ZEBULUN }
They always camped in the above form (in the form of a cross). On the
inside, encamped in four groups, were the Levites and the priests. The priests,
the sons of Aaron, camped upon the east, and the other three groups inside the
other camps, right next to the court itself.
We are not told so in the Bible, but Jewish writers tell us that the insignia
of these four groups was:
Reuben — a man Judah — a lion
Dan — a flying eagle Ephraim — an ox
They had these on their banners; when they marched they marched with
these banners afloat. In their line of march the Tabernacle was in the center,
carried by the Levites, with all the furniture wrapped. Judah, and the three tribes
with Judah, went in the lead just as they were encamped; while Reuben was on
the south and Dan on the north, with Ephraim and his tribes in the rear.

18
 There was nothing done at random. We shall find that everything in this
Tabernacle had its significance.

The Tabernacle
___Lesson Thirteen___

We resume our study with Hebrews 9:6:

“Now when these things were thus ordained, the priests went always
into the first tabernacle, accomplishing the service of God.”
By that “first tabernacle” is meant the Holy Place. In this compartment
were placed the golden candlestick upon the left-hand side as one entered, and
the table of shewbread upon the right side. Just before the veil stood the altar of
incense.

The Golden Candlestick

We are given a little view as to what the golden candlestick represented
from the vision which John had on the Isle of Patmos. He turned to see the Voice
which spoke, and he saw seven candlesticks. We are told that these were the
seven churches. That is evidently typical of the seven churches and the light
which they shed forth in the darkened world, through the Spirit. The candlesticks
were fed with oil; and the oil throughout Scripture is typical of the Spirit.
Therefore the light of the Church shines forth through the Spirit, through the
indwelling of the Spirit.
The priests went in daily and lighted the lamps on the candlestick and kept
them burning at night. They were put out in the day time.

The Table of Shewbread

The table of shewbread was renewed every Sabbath. There were twelve
loaves, six in a row, representing the twelve tribes of Israel. As they were
renewed, the old were taken away and given to the priests to eat. It was lawful
for them to have the shewbread.
We have been given an interpretation of this when Jesus said:
“I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat
of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh,
which I will give for the life of the world” (John 6:51).
He (Christ) being the Word incarnate, we have then the typical meaning of
that bread: that it was the Word of God. Job said that the Word meant more to

19
him than his necessary food. In fact, we find typified throughout the Tabernacle
service that what was needed to sustain the body was typical all the way through
of what was necessary to sustain the soul. The visible and material followed
along in the Tabernacle service with the unseen and the spiritual.

The Altar of Incense

There was the altar of incense. The priests in their daily service, morning
and night, burned incense upon this altar. The officiating priest (priests officiated
by courses, each one having his turn) took coals from off the brazen altar where
the fire was kept burning continuously and put it into his censer. It is supposed
that he placed those coals upon the golden altar and then put the incense
upon it.
We have already seen the significance of that altar of incense as shown in
the 8th chapter of Revelation, where we are told of an angel with a golden censer
who stood before the altar and offered up the incense with the prayers of the
saints to God. Incense signifies prayer.
That is what the Psalmist had reference to when he 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).

The Day of Atonement

“But into the second went the high priest alone once every year, not
without blood, which he offered for himself, and for the errors of the
people” (Hebrews 9:7).
It was before this Holy of Holies that the veil hung, very much orna-
mented, adorned with cherubims. It was made of costly material. No one ever
went in there but the high priest, and he only once a year upon the Day of
Atonement. The Day of Atonement signifies his mission in going in there. This
was the one phase which the Law prescribed; all the others were voluntary.
The Children of Israel fasted this day and lamented before the Lord. It was
a time of national repentance. The high priest went into the Holy of Holies with
the blood of the bullock that was slain upon the brazen altar and made
atonement first for his own sins and then for the sins of the people and for the
priesthood. He returned to the brazen altar that stood in the courtyard.
Two goats were brought in. One of these was slain; and upon the other
the high priest laid his hands and confessed the sins of the people, then the goat
was driven out into the wilderness. He was the scapegoat. Of course the
fulfillment of that is too obvious to need any further explanation. Jesus was the
scapegoat for us.

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The Ark
Then there was the Ark. Within this Ark were the Tables of Stone, and
upon the cover of the Ark were the cherubims, two of them facing each other and
their wings meeting. These cherubims are supposed to have been similar to the
angels. They represented the angels. There they look down upon the Law within
the Ark which represents God’s judgment. God’s judgment required a measuring
up to the standards set forth in the Law, but between the cherubims and the Law
was the Mercy Seat.
That foreshadowed God’s mercy. Where men failed to measure up to His
commandments and precepts, there was mercy extended. In Romans 3:25 we
read, where Paul is speaking of Jesus:
“Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his
blood, . . .”
That word “propitiation” is the same word as that used for Mercy Seat. So
Jesus became the Mercy Seat, not only for the Jews, but for the whole world.
There was nothing in the Tabernacle service, in its furnishings, or in the service
that was conducted but that had its significance. Nothing was done at random.
Above the Mercy Seat, just above where the wings of the cherubims met,
shone the Shekinah glory of the Lord. As Israel encamped, that pillar of cloud by
day and pillar of fire by night settled down right over the spot where the Ark was;
and there shone this Shekinah glory — a super natural glow of light. It was an
evidence of God’s presence in their midst. The Holy of Holies, therefore,
represented the very dwelling place of God Himself; and none of the Children of
Israel could approach unto it, not even the priests — only the high priest, and he
once a year on the Day of Atonement.
It reminds us of those words of Paul when he says that none can ap-
proach unto His glory. (See I Timothy 6:16.)

Figures
“The Holy Ghost this signifying, that the way into the holiest of all
was not yet made manifest, while as the first tabernacle was yet standing”
(Hebrews 9:8).
This intimates that the Tabernacle with all its services was only temporary
— for a short period. It also, to my mind, implies the giving of the Holy Ghost, as
we shall see presently from some other passages of Scripture. The significance
of this Holiest of All was not yet made manifest while the Tabernacle stood. That
implies that there was a time when its significance was made manifest. It also
indicates that the dispensation of the Holy Ghost began with Jesus’ entering into
His Priesthood. For this reason He said to His disciples: “Nevertheless I tell you
the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter

21
will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you” (John 16:7).
When He ascended from the Mount of Olives He entered into that Tabernacle
upon His second office, that of Priesthood. It was at that time that the Holy Ghost
was sent.
“Which was a figure for the time then present, in which were offered
both gifts and sacrifices, that could not make him that did the service
perfect, . . .” (Hebrews 9:9).
That leads us to inquire: Wherein was the virtue of these sacrifices? Why
were they ordained of God if there was no possibilty of any spiritual perfection
here? That is the very line that Paul follows through this entire chapter. It had
significance only as it pointed to the spiritual. These sacrifices and offerings had
no virtue in themselves; and where the Jews failed in this Old Testament service
was that they could not by faith see Jesus, to whom all the sacrifices pointed.
The offerings and sacrifices lost their typical significance and became to them the
all-important thing. What should have been all-important was the typical
significance and not the sacrifice and offering. An offering itself was only a
shadow.
We have very much the same thing in our service. Jesus instituted the
ordinance of the Lord’s Supper. That in a way corresponds very much to these
ordinances which they had under the Old Dispensation. But what is the virtue in
the Lord’s Supper? Is there any virtue contained in the elements, the grape-juice
or the bread? No. There are some who think there is. The Catholic Church has
instituted the doctrine of transubstantiation: that is, that through a miracle the
bread and the wine are actually converted into the body and shed Blood of the
Lord. That is their doctrine. They have done exactly what the Jews did; they have
taken what God intended only for a type to try to picture before us the unseen,
and have made that their object of worship.
Back as far as Eli’s time men did the same thing. That Ark abiding in the
Holiest of All was simply an emblem of God’s presence. God’s presence actually
dwelt there, but the Ark itself was an emblem. In Eli’s time the Israelites took that
Ark, contrary to the Law, from the Tabernacle and brought it into the field of
battle. Why? Because they thought the Ark had some virtue and power in it that
would give them the victory against the Philistines. God rebuked them by a
disastrous defeat and let that Ark fall into the hands of the pagans because they
had misconstrued its meaning and saw virtue in the Ark itself.
When any religious body takes a type or a symbol and worships it, that
worship has descended to fetishism — nothing else. The Ark to the Jews at this
time had become a mere fetish. The only value that these ordinances, sacrifices
and gifts had was the spiritual significance which they symbolized.
God had instituted the Tabernacle with its elaborate service in
condescension to the human mind. The Israelites had come out of Egypt; they
were just like kindergarten children. In the kindergarten, if one wants to teach
arithmetic, he takes for example two objects, and puts them together: one and
one make two. If they want to teach fractions they may take an apple and divide

22
it into halves, or smaller parts to illustrate how parts make a whole. But when
those pupils are a little farther advanced they have the abstract number on the
board. Sometimes they do not even have that; they must mentally carry out the
process of arithmetic because they are in an advanced grade.
The Lord dealt with His people along the same lines. The Israelites were
going through a kindergarten period, spiritually, and the Lord was condescending
to their weakness; and He instituted these things to illustrate the spiritual. But
they failed to see beyond the illustration. They did not see Jesus to whom it all
pointed.
Even in Jesus’ time the disciples sometimes would take His parables
literally. Jesus spoke in parables, took the visible things of this world to illustrate
the spiritual, because there is a wonderful parallel between the visible and the
spiritual all the way through. He used these things to try to bring plainly before
them the spiritual. And how often they misinterpreted it and took it literally!
An example of that was seen when He warned them of the leaven of the
Pharisees and they understood it to mean that He was rebuking them because
they had failed to bring bread on their journey. Then Jesus turned to them and
said:
“How is it that ye do not understand that I spake it not to you
concerning bread, that ye should beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and
of the Sadducees?
“Then understood they how that he bade them not beware of the
leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees”
(Matthew 16:11, 12).
These things, so far as the Jews were concerned, largely failed of their
purpose. That was why the Jews began to put so much stress upon the minutiae
— the little forms through which they went. That became their religion and they
left out the weightier things of judgment and mercy which they should have done
and not to have left the other undone.

The Rending of the Veil

In Matthew 27:50, 51 we read of something that took place at the time of
the crucifixion of Jesus:
“Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the
ghost.
“And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to
the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent.”
That rending of the veil signified, as the author states in the 10th chapter
of Hebrews, that the way into the Holiest of All was opened.
“Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the
blood of Jesus,

23
 “By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through
the veil, that is to say, his flesh” (Hebrews 10:19, 20).
What do we find that veil typifying? It was the body of the Lord Jesus
Christ which was rent in the crucifixion. The way was opened into the Holiest of
All, the baptism of the Holy Ghost, which up to this time had not been made
manifest. That which had not been revealed in the Old Testament was the giving
of the Holy Ghost. That is the one thing which marks the New Dispensation from
the Old in the way of spiritual experiences. They had not had the baptism of the
Holy Ghost in the Old Dispensation.

The Brazen Altar

They had justification, typified by the brazen altar standing outside the
Tabernacle, in the court. This necessarily signifies justification, because here
was brought the sacrifice for sins, or trespasses; and when the one bringing that
sacrifice brought it in faith, and it was offered according to the Law, his sins were
forgiven. If he accepted it in faith, he had a real experience of salvation just as
we secure it today.
The type of sanctification is brought out in Hebrews 13:11, 12:
“For the bodies of those beasts, whose blood is brought into the
sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned without the camp.
“Wherefore Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his
own blood, suffered without the gate” (Hebrews 13:11, 12).
This high priest took the blood of the bullock and went into the Holy Place
and sprinkled the blood of the sin offering upon the horns of the golden altar. We
are told that the Law provided that the bodies of those beasts whose blood was
taken into the sanctuary should be completely burned in a clean place outside
the camp (Leviticus 4:1-12).
Then what are we to believe is the significance of taking the blood into the
sanctuary and placing it upon the golden altar? Sanctification. We have Scriptural
authority for that.
The third place (the Holiest of All) being opened up at this time through the
crucifixion of Jesus Christ that we might enter boldly into the place where only
the high priest had gone once a year, gives us a privilege that they never
possessed in the Old Dispensation. We can only construe that as being the
mighty baptism of the Holy Ghost, where we have the Shekinah glory of the Lord
resting upon us even as the flame of fire rested upon the disciples when the Holy
Ghost descended upon the Day of Pentecost.
We have represented in the Tabernacle the three great experiences which
God gives: justification, sanctification, and the baptism of the Holy Ghost.

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The Time of Reformation
“Which stood only in meats and drinks, and divers washings, and
carnal ordinances, imposed on them until the time of reformation”
(Hebrews 9:10).
It is not difficult to know what that time of reformation is: it is the time when
the significance of all these things would be made plain, the Dispensation of
Grace.
“But 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” (Hebrews 9:11).
That Tabernacle was pitched in the wilderness; but the true Tabernacle,
which he had already mentioned as being the one which the Lord pitched and not
man, is brought out very clearly in the 24th verse of this 9th chapter.
“For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands,
which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in
the presence of God for us.”
That is unfolded to us in Jesus Christ’s entering into Heaven itself. The
whole Tabernacle service was fulfilled in Him when He entered upon His
Priesthood.
“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 for
us” (Hebrews 9:12).
The high priest always went into the Tabernacle with blood. The priests
never approached unto the Lord without blood. So it was necessary that Jesus,
as the High Priest, should have blood. The priests took in the blood of bulls and
goats. Here we have a perfect fulfillment of that Tabernacle service when Jesus
entered the heavenly Tabernacle, taking His own Blood with which to make
intercession.
Outside the Tabernacle proper stood the brazen altar where the sacrifices
for sin were brought. Upon Mount Calvary, outside the true Tabernacle, Jesus
Christ offered up Himself a sacrifice; and then as High Priest, with the Blood that
was shed, He went into the Tabernacle and took up His office as High Priest.
You can see how perfectly that was fulfilled. Not even the furniture was placed at
random; nor were any of the services without significance.
“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”
(Hebrews 9:13).
All that outward purifying was simply typical of the inward purifying.
“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?” (Hebrews 9:14).

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 That shows us the spiritual side of it, that through the Blood of Jesus
Christ our consciences are purged. That is why there is no condemnation for him
who is in Christ Jesus. It is the guilty conscience which brings condemnation.
When that is purged and cleansed there is no condemnation.
“And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament,. .
That is the same word which is elsewhere translated “covenant.” It could
just as well be called the Old Covenant and the New — the words are the same.
But he has used the word “testament” here because he is bringing out another
figure. A testament is, in our usage, also a will — which a covenant is not.
Therefore, in this present case he calls it a testament.
“. . . that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions
that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the
promise of eternal inheritance” (Hebrews 9:15).

Universal Atonement
The sacrifice of Jesus Christ reached back into the period of the Law; and
forward to the New Dispensation. It was a universal Atonement which was all-
comprehensive and all-availing. It took in all mankind: the Jews and the Gentiles.
Not only that, but it was done once and for all. Jesus did not enter in yearly as a
great high priest did; but this was given once and for all, and thus it stands an
eternal Atonement, the great Atonement which Jesus provided for the whole
round world, extending over all ages and for all times.
Men try to give substitutes for it, but there is no substitute which God will
receive. There was a time when Saul, in his backslidden condition, had broken
the covenant which Israel had made with the Gibeonites that their lives should be
spared. By deceit that covenant was negotiated; but because the Israelites swore
by the Lord, the Lord held them to it. The covenant stood, and the Israelites were
under bondage to protect those Gibeonites. Saul, in his mistaken zeal, slew the
Gibeonites. About forty years later a three-years’ famine came on the land in the
time of David. He inquired of the Lord why there was a famine; and the Lord
revealed to him that it was because Saul had slain the Gibeonites and thus had
broken the covenant. David went to the Gibeonites to find what they demanded
in order that this might be righted. They demanded no silver nor ransom, nor that
David himself should take the life of any man in Israel; but they did demand
seven sons of Saul. David delivered them up to the Gibeonites. They slew them
and the famine was lifted.
Are we to understand by this that the Lord accepted the death of those
sons as an atonement for the wrong which Israel had done? Never for a moment!
The Lord accepts no substitute of any kind for that all-availing Atonement that He
Himself has provided. We have but one conclusion, and that is that these sons of
Saul themselves were implicated and died because of their own guilt.

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 You will not find throughout all God’s dealings with mankind one instance
in which the guiltless died for the guilty except the one occasion in which Christ
Jesus died for sinners — the just for the unjust. We find mercy in the sight of the
Lord, but not because of any virtue that we possess. Any good deeds, any
charitableness which we show, any kindness will not purchase our salvation. The
favor from day to day which we have in the sight of the Lord is just because of
that Atonement which stands with Jesus Christ, our High Priest, before the
Throne.
It is true that we are rewarded for our good deeds. We are rewarded for
the works which we do in the Spirit (and only those that are done in the Spirit)
and nothing else. But we do not find mercy in the sight of the Lord through our
works. Therefore good works, self-righteousness, any virtues within a man,
cannot purchase salvation. The only means by which any man (the very best
man who ever lived to the very worst) can find any grace in the eyes of the Lord
is through the Atonement.

The Testament
“And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by
means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under
the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of
eternal inheritance” (Hebrews 9:15).
He is likening this to a testament, or a will, because he speaks here of an
inheritance. A covenant always has conditions imposed in it for both sides: one
party to the covenant agrees to do certain things provided the other party fulfills
certain conditions. But a testament does not necessarily have any conditions
imposed. That is a legacy which is left voluntarily by some person.
When a man makes out his will he can make it without imposing any
conditions at all on the heirs who are benefited. The essence of the will is that he
makes a legacy, he bequeaths it. Therefore Paul likens it here to an inheritance.
That was under the Old Dispensation. Under this New Dispensation we have an
inheritance; it is our heavenly inheritance and grander and more glorious than the
Jews had.
“For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death
of the testator” (Hebrews 9:16).
There must be the death of him who makes the will. It does not become of
force until he is dead.
“For a testament is of force after men are dead: otherwise it is of no
strength at all while the testator liveth.
“Whereupon neither the first testament was dedicated without
blood” (Hebrews 9:17, 18).

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 It was upon the death of Jesus Christ that His will or testament became
available and we entered into it. You remember when He ate that Last Supper
and gave the cup to His disciples He said, “For this is my blood of the new
testament” (or the New Covenant which had been ushered in).
“For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people
according to the law, he took the blood of calves and of goats, with water,
and scarlet wool, and hyssop, . . .
The hyssop was bound around with scarlet wool and was used for the
sprinkling of the blood. The hyssop was a shrub which grew in that country and
was used for the sprinkling of blood. That is what the Psalmist had reference to
when he said, “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean” (Psalm 51:7).
“. . . and sprinkled both the book, and all the people,
“Saying, This is the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined
unto you.
“Moreover he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle, and all the
vessels of the ministry” (Hebrews 9:19-21).
The entire service of God, from the Tabernacle with all its vessels and the
Law itself, down to the people who worshiped, signifies the Law.

Purified by Blood
“And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without
shedding of blood is no remission” (Hebrews 9:22).
You can see how far afield modernists have gone. They take out page
after page of God’s Word. What are they going to do about these things which
are facing them? If this Bible is worth anything at all it is worth keeping from
cover to cover, and taking at its face value — as well as its faith value.
“It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens
should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with
better sacrifices than these” (Hebrews 9:23).
That is the copy of the heavenly things. He calls it the pattern here. The
copy of heavenly things was purified with the blood of bulls and goats, but the
heavenly things themselves, from which the copy was taken, must necessarily be
purified with better things.
“For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands,
which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in
the presence of God for us” (Hebrews 9:24).
There are three grand appearances of Jesus with which this chapter
closes which we want to take up. We shall take them up in their historical order
instead of as they are presented in this chapter. The first one is the 26th verse:

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 “For then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the
world: but now once in the end of the world [That means “age,” the end of
the Jewish age, or the end of the old dispensation.] hath he appeared to put
away sin by the sacrifice of himself” (Hebrews 9:26).
That refers to His first coming, and that was His purpose in coming: to
present Himself a sacrifice. That was the supreme thing for which He came. It
was true He came also to give us teachings. He came as God’s representative to
earth. He was a good example; He taught precepts that commend themselves to
every man’s conscience. But that was not the very essence of His mission to this
world. The very heart and center of it was that He came to offer Himself to the
world a sacrifice; and thus only could He come to save sinners. It took nothing
less than that to save them.
Here is another point in which modernists have gone astray entirely. They
put much stress on the life of Jesus, on the teachings of Jesus; and ignore the
sacrifice of Jesus. If you ignore the sacrifice you have ignored everything, for
without that His teachings are unavailing.
What did His teachings mean to you and to me when we were out in the
world in sin? when we had a carnal nature that was fighting against all
righteousness and everything that was good and pure? It was true we had a
conscience which told us better, and we often tried to line up to that conscience,
but we failed as often as we tried. Why? Because of the war that was going on
inside — the carnal nature that would not be subject to the law of God. Then
what did these teachings mean to us? Absolutely nothing. But when that all-
availing Atonement was believed, and we repented—the Blood was applied, our
conscience was purified so that no more condemnation rested upon it — then the
teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ meant something to us. We could live up to
the standard He preached and taught.
We can be built up in this holy faith. It is a marvelous thing for us, with that
carnal nature destroyed, our conscience purified, to be able to open up this Book
of God and study that Holy Word and assimilate it. Without that there is no such
thing as those teachings working out any thing in the heart. That is what God had
reference to in speaking through Jeremiah when he said:
“Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will make a new
covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah:
“Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the
day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt;
which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith
the LORD:
“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 31:31-33).

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 That is why we assemble night after night that we might have this law
which embraces all the Word from Genesis to Revelation, written, precept upon
precept, line upon line, in our hearts, and be built up to where we attain to the full
stature of Christ. It says that we are to take that Word, assimilate it, line up to it,
and deepen our consecrations as we see what God is demanding of us, so that
we may have that full stature of Christ.
Our spiritual development is going to be measured by the extent to which
you and I keep up that daily consecration; just as the burnt offerings were
brought there day and night and offered up upon that brazen altar which signified
daily offerings unto the Lord. You and I are never going to get by with the
consecrations which were made last year, not even last month, last week or
yesterday; they will have to be renewed daily.

Three Offices of Christ

“For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands,
which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in
the presence of God for us” (Hebrews 9:24).
That is the office which He is now fulfilling, that of Priest, interceding
before God for us. For nineteen centuries His mediatorial Throne has been
occupied.
“So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them
that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto
salvation” (Hebrews 9:28).
That remains yet to be fulfilled when He will come back again. There are
His three great appearances: coming first to offer Himself a sacrifice; going with
His Blood into the Holiest of All; and then leaving that mediatorial Throne and
taking up His office of King. We have set forth in three comings His offices of
Prophet, Priest, and King.
When the Lord commanded Moses to make a Tabernacle, He gave the
reason for it. He said:
“And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them”
(Exodus 25:8).
That was the purpose — that God might dwell among the Israelites. See
here how He condescended to them. They were all dwelling in tents, so He
Himself chose to dwell in a tent with them that they might be His people and He
their God; that they might be to Him a peculiar people, a royal priesthood and a
holy nation. There He was in the midst of them as we see from the plan on page
18, in the very center of the camp among them.
John says, “And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us” (John
1:14). So Jesus fulfilled the figure of the Tabernacle in taking upon Himself not
the form of angels, but the seed of Abraham, being made like unto His brethren,
and tabernacling among us. Emmanuel means “God with us.” Then you can see

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the great significance of that passage in the 10th chapter which we shall study in
the next lesson.
“Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and
offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me”
(Hebrews 10:5).
Just as that Tabernacle was reared in the wilderness, so God under the
New Testament, under the New Covenant, prepared Him a body to take the
place of that Tabernacle.

The Importance of the Atonement

___Lesson Fourteen___

We now take up the 10th chapter of Hebrews.

“For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the
very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered
year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect”
(Hebrews 10:1).
Some of these passages sound as if they spoke disparagingly of the Law.
The writer is not speaking here of any imperfection in the Law. It filled the place it
was meant to fill. Where the imperfection lay was in the inability of man to be
converted by the works of the Law alone, without faith in Jesus. It could never by
those sacrifices make the comers there unto perfect.
It was a very significant incident when Moses came down out of the Mount
with the two tables of stone. Those commandments were written with the finger
of God; they came direct from Heaven. This was the first giving of the Law. But
as Moses approached the camp he heard the noise of singing, and he and
Joshua wondered what was transpiring. As they approached they saw to their
astonishment that multitude dancing about a golden calf.

Idolatry
The Israelites broke the very first commandment written upon those tables
of stone. They proved then and there their inability to keep the Law of God
without a change of heart. The first commandment was: “Thou shalt have no
other gods before me.” There they were: they had erected a golden image and
were dancing around it. Moses cast down the tables of stone and broke them —
significant of what Israel had already done. Their inability to keep the first
commandment showed their inability to keep any of them, because the first
commandment is all-inclusive.

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 No one can keep the commandments of God unless God takes first place
in his life. Israel not only thus broke the first commandment, but they indicated
what was their besetting sin all the way through: turning to idolatry. That was the
one thing which the Israelites were guilty of throughout their entire sojourn in the
Promised Land.
Not only was Israel guilty of this, but I believe that is the besetting sin of
the entire world. It is not necessary to set up a golden calf or bow down to a
graven image or to worship Molech or Ashtaroth to be engaged in idolatry. The
crying sin of the world today is idolatry. Idolatry consists of giving God second
place to anything else that is in your life. Not only are sinners guilty of this, but
often so-called believers.
The rebuke that was brought against the church of Ephesus was: “Thou
hast left thy first love” (Revelation 2:4). Their first love had grown cold. And that is
the first symptom of an idolatrous trend, when one’s love begins to grow cold,
when one begins to become indifferent.
When a man comes into the experience of justification or any other
experience that God gives him, he has taken on a position that God expects him
to continue in with the same fervency of spirit, with the same circumspect walk,
with the same diligence, with the same devotion with which he secured that
experience.
It does not necessarily mean that he will always be jubilant, that he will
always have a mountain-top experience; but it does mean that above all things
God takes first place in his life under all and every circumstance.

The Tabernacle Service

Now comes in the reason for all the Tabernacle service, the appointment
of priests, the giving of sacrifice. We found that, according to the plan of the
Tabernacle, it was a means by which the Children of Israel should draw nigh unto
God. It was through the veils, through the mediatorial ministry of the priests
intervening between them and God, mediating the Covenant which God had
made with them. The whole order of the service was set forth as a type of the
way in which a man shall approach God, draw nigh unto God.
“For the law having a shadow of good things to come, . . .”
This does not say the Law was a shadow, but it says it had a shadow.
What was the shadow? Those very services which God had ordained by which
they might draw nigh unto Him. A shadow is about the most intangible, transitory,
thing that we can think of in this present life. That is what the author meant when
he said that the Law had shadows of good things to come, and not the very
image of the things.
There is a vast difference between an image and a shadow. The Law was
a shadow but Jesus Christ was the Image that was casting the shadow. He was
the express Image of the Person of God. Not only had the Law shadows in this

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respect, but the priests were also shadows, as it were. That is brought out in one
of the chapters we have already had in Hebrews.
“Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things, as
Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the
tabernacle: . . .” (Hebrews 8:5).
So the priests themselves served as shadows also. The sacrifices which
were offered were offered repeatedly. Why? Because they were transitory. The
very fact that they had to be repeated again and again showed the
ineffectiveness of those very sacrifices, that they were of a transitory nature. We
will read down a little bit in this verse.
“For then would they not have ceased to be offered? because that
the worshippers once purged should have had no more conscience of
sins” (Hebrews 10:2).
There is not a system by which the conscience can be purged other than
through the Blood of Jesus. No system will meet the requirements of God,
because God requires a man to have a conscience void of offence toward Him
and man. And any system which does not go deep enough and is not thorough
enough to do that is not God’s system. That is why the substitutes today are
falling down on the job completely. They cannot lift the condemnation that rests
upon the conscience.
“But in those sacrifices there is a remembrance again made of sins
every year.
“For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should
take away sins” (Hebrews 10:3, 4).
There we have evidence that the sacrifices were of a transitory nature. He
also says that the blood of bulls and goats will not suffice to take away sins. We
have already studied the Tabernacle descriptions of it given in the beginning of
the 9th chapter. All the Tabernacle service was of a perishable order. There was
not a thing but that was of the material which would perish with the using. You
can go through the whole Levitical economy and you will find that it was of a
temporary nature.
Take even the Law itself as framed in the Old Testament. We found that it
was for Israel alone. It was never imposed upon any other nation. If any other
individual came under that Law it was because he was adopted into the
Israelitish nation; and thus only was the Law applicable to him. Therefore the
Law, the priesthood, the sacrifices, the blood that was offered, the Tabernacle,
were all of a temporary order.
It states here that it had a shadow of good things to come. It was a symbol
of those things that were to come, and was imposed upon them until the time of
reformation: “The Holy Ghost this signifying, that the way into the holiest of all
was not yet made manifest, while as the first tabernacle was yet standing”
(Hebrews 9:8). That signifies or implies that there was a time when it would not
stand. All this Tabernacle service with its elaborate ritual and its priesthood, its

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sacrifices which they went through daily and on their feast days, their sabbaths,
their annual feasts compare with the ordinances which we have under the
present dispensation of the Lord’s Supper, washing of the disciples’ feet, water
baptism. We find in I Corinthians 5:7, 8 how the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper
came to be instituted.
“Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as
ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us:
“Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the
leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of
sincerity and truth.”
This Christian ordinance took the place of the Passover which they had.
And our Passover was slain — which was Christ Jesus, the Lamb of God that
“taketh away the sin of the world.” Then Paul goes on to say in
I Corinthians 11:26:
“For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do shew the
Lord’s death till he come.”

Ordinances
The Old Testament symbols or shadows pointed forward to the good
things which were to come. Here we have an ordinance which points back to the
things that have already come. “Ye do shew the Lord’s death till he come.” That
is, the Lord’s death is now an historical event. Then it was a prophetic event to
which these symbols pointed.
“For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh
damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body” (I Corinthians 11:29).
In other words, that bread and wine typify the Lord’s body. Concerning the
ordinance of footwashing, the Lord said to His disciples:
“If I then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet; ye also
ought to wash one another’s feet.
“For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done
to you” (John 13:14, 15).
Jesus there gave us an ordinance that points back — not forward — to the
example which He gave us of service; for He said in another place:
“And whosoever of you will be the chiefest, shall be servant of all.
“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 10:44, 45).
There we have the Lord’s Supper symbolical of the broken body and the
shed Blood of Jesus Christ. We have the footwashing symbolical of His service,
that He came not to be ministered unto, but to minister. Regarding the Lord’s
plan of water baptism, in Acts 22:16, we read:

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 “And now why tarriest thou? arise, and be baptized, and wash away
thy sins, calling on the name of the Lord.”
Those were the words of Ananias to Paul. For one thing, water baptism
symbolizes that one’s sins have been washed away. Then Paul tells us:
“Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as
Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we
also should walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:4).
That is a beautiful figure Paul has given us of what water baptism
signifies, that as Jesus Christ died, was buried and then arose again, so he that
goes down into the water goes down in the likeness of His death and is raised in
the likeness of His resurrection to walk in newness of life. Every one of these
ordinances symbolizes a great truth; and the only virtue they have is the fact that
they do symbolize these truths.
There is no intrinsic value in the ordinances themselves. It was the same
under the Mosaic dispensation. The sacrifices of bulls and goats had no value in
them; the blood of bulls had no virtue in it. The furnishings of the Tabernacle,
even to the Ark of the Covenant, contained no value except by their symbolic
import. What they pointed to and what God intended was that these Israelites
should see back of the symbols the truth He was trying to impress upon them.
What good is a parable of the Lord Jesus Christ if we do not gather the spiritual
teaching which underlies it?
Jesus rebuked His disciples for that very thing. He wanted to know if they
were also without understanding like those on the outside, and then interpreted
certain of the parables which they asked Him about. It is the same with every
symbol which the Lord gives us: it is a physical representation of a great spiritual
truth.
It was never intended that this Tabernacle service, as elaborate as it was,
should constitute the heart and center of their religion. The Lord expected it to be
a representative of the spiritual truths that lay underneath them, and the spiritual
truths to which they pointed ahead.
Abraham saw the significance before the Law was ever given. Jesus said,
“Abraham rejoiced to see my day.” What is the significance of that? Abraham
rejoiced in the great Gospel dispensation of which he had been given a foretaste
centuries before. All those great men of God saw it. Moses, as he came into
contact with God up on the Mount, and as he was given the Law, saw beyond all
that, to what it should mean to Israel — righteousness in the life, holiness and an
upright walk before the Lord, without which the symbols meant nothing.
That was the very point in which the Israelites failed: they took the shadow
and made it the substance. The all-important thing to them was to go through the
routine, to go through the motions, to keep up that service. They never let down
on one detail; indeed, they reached the point where they added much that was
not in the Law at all.

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Superficial Worship
We have people who are doing the same thing today. The Seventh Day
Adventists are repeating what the Israelites did; they are taking, the shadows and
trying to make them the substance. It is true also of many other religions. The
nominal church has fallen into the same rut where their emphasis is put upon
their service, the form through which they go, or upon church organization —
their committees, boards, elders, deacons; their program, their financial budget. It
is the all-important thing to them — just the surface without ever getting down to
the main issue.
That is why we have repeated time and time again that the very first and
all-important thing is that a man go down before the Lord and seek Him until he
gets a real, spiritual experience; then it matters not so much whether he joins our
church or any other church. He is a member of the Church of Christ.
Man is ever prone to reverse God’s order, to take what is superficial and
make it fundamental. If one has left out the symbolic significances of any
ordinance which the Lord gives, he might as well discard the symbol.
Turn to Isaiah 1:10. This was written about 700 B. C. when the Israelites
had lapsed into forms and ceremonies.
“Hear the word of the LORD, ye rulers of Sodom; give ear unto the
law of our God, ye people of Gomorrah.”
These are typical names he is giving the Israelites because of the sins
they had taken on.
“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.
“When ye come to appear before me, who hath required this at your
hand, to tread my courts?” (Isaiah 1:11, 12).
Those priests were marching in and out with solemn parade, dressed in
their vestments, going through their daily routine, going by course into the Holy
Place with their censers, lighting the lamps, putting the incense on the golden
altar, changing the bread upon the table every week; but their lives were full of
sin. They were practicing fraud, deception, failing to measure up to the
commandments of God, walking in duplicity. Yet when they came to tread the
courts of the Lord, they walked very soberly and piously, with their long robes
and their phylacteries and everything else that went with it. No wonder the Lord
was sick of it.
“Bring no more vain oblations; incense is an abomination unto me;
the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away
with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting.
“Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth: they
are a trouble unto me; I am weary to bear them.

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 “And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from
you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of
blood” (Isaiah 1:13-15).
What was it that the Lord wanted?
“Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from
before mine eyes; cease to do evil;
“Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the
fatherless, plead for the widow” (Isaiah 1:16, 17).
Let there be some justice in the land, let righteousness be manifested.
Then again in Isaiah 58:
“Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, [That is what
the Lord is saying to the priests.] and shew my people their transgression,
and the house of Jacob their sins.
“Yet they seek me daily, and delight to know my ways, as a nation
that did righteousness, and forsook not the ordinance of their God: they
ask of me the ordinances of justice; they take delight in approaching to
God.
“Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? wherefore
have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the
day of your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours.
“Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of
wickedness: ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be
heard on high.
“Is it such a fast that I have chosen? a day for a man to afflict his
soul? is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and
ashes under him? wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the
LORD?
“Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of
wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free,
and that ye break every yoke?
“Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor
that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover
him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?” (Isaiah 58:1-7).
That is what the Lord was seeking all the time in Israel and they were
failing to do it. One of the great faults of the entire human race is to institute a
superficial religion and substitute it for the truth. That is the perversion that has
been made in Christianity today. They have been guilty of it down through the
ages. The Gentiles have done with the Gospel of the Lord Jesus what the Jews
did with the Law of God. The Jews lost the substance and substituted the
superficial.

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 That is what Jeremiah charged Israel with:
“For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the
fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns,
that can hold no water” (Jeremiah 2:13).
We can thank God that we are in a Gospel where first things have been
put first, there the emphasis has been put upon things that God emphasizes. It is
true that not one thing is to be left out, but then there are some things in His
Word that are more important than others; and He expects us to have enough
common sense to put the emphasis upon the important things and to keep them
first and foremost always.
Jesus appeared upon the scene to revive what had been lost under the
dispensation of the scribes and Pharisees, to bring out the true meaning of the
Law of God. Read the Sermon on the Mount; that is a true interpretation of the
Law of God. That has a great deal of the thunder of Sinai in it.
We talk about this being the Dispensation of Grace, and so it is; but you
will find much of the thunderings of the Law, especially in the discourse of Jesus
Christ in the New Testament; and the Sermon on the Mount is particularly full of
it. There He lays the Law to the line and brings forth the true interpretation. That
had been lost under the old Israelitish dispensation. We can see, then, how the
whole symbolic significance of the Old Covenant had been lost.
While this Old Covenant was of a temporary nature, we find in the study of
this Book of Hebrews that the New Covenant was the very opposite. It is
declared to have a permanent nature. We can go through the Old Covenant and
take one point after another and find where it has its parallel under the New
Covenant. Whereas the one was transitory and fleeting, the other is permanent
and eternal.
The Law under the Old Covenant was written on cold tables of stone, but
the place where the Lord has always wanted to write that covenant is upon the
fleshy tables of the heart. That is one of the cardinal truths of the New
Dispensation.

The Perfect Love

When a man is justified, he is given power to keep the Law, to keep the
commandments. But what is the particular experience that writes that covenant
upon the heart? Sanctification. You will find in this 10th chapter that the author
talks a good deal about the matter of sanctification. Sanctification is also known
as the perfecting of love. Paul tells us, “Love worketh no ill to his neighbour:
therefore love is the fulfilling of the law” (Romans 13:10).
Paul, in that wonderful 13th chapter of I Corinthians, says, “Charity never
faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be
tongues, they shall cease.” Many people are putting great stress on prophecy
and tongues. “. . . whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away”

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(I Corinthians 13:8). They are putting great stress on knowing the Word of God
— and it is important.
There is such a thing as prophecy, such a thing as tongues; but those are
not the all-important things. The important thing is that which never faileth, that is
not going to pass away: the love of God in the heart. It never fails. Therefore we
have in the Old Covenant the Law and the tables of stone which passed away. If
that were to have continued we would have had the tables today. No one knows
what became of them; they are gone; they perished. But we do have the law
written on the heart.

Eternal Life
We are told now that the thing that perfects us is going to continue. It will
never fail. You say, “Oh, but that is like eternal security!” No. You can backslide
from it and lose that thing, but the law still stands, and it is just as unfailing as it
was before. Where does the failure come in? It comes in the individual himself.
Jesus said:
“And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish,
neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand” (John 10:28).
But they can pluck themselves out. Those who have the law written on
their hearts have eternal life, and they never shall perish so long as that law is
retained there, and they continue in the way to which Jesus has called them. It is
true that no individual can pluck a person out of the Father’s hand, but any time a
person wants to he can take himself out; and a good many do it.

Christ, the Perfect Offering

Regarding the Levitical priesthood, we found that the priests were many
and they succeeded one another, because of death. They had to have a
continual order of priests — generation after generation. But what have we in
place of this Levitical order? The Priesthood of Christ, after the order of
Melchisedec, which shall never pass away.
The sacrifices of animals were kept up year in and year out. But what
sacrifice have we under the New Covenant? Christ, who offered Himself once for
all, a sacrifice which stands eternally and universally. It is for the entire world,
without any repetition.
Here is another place where the Catholic order is absolutely contrary to
the Word of God. A Council of Trent formulated the Catholic Creed and they
distinctly say that the mass is a sacrifice with provisory virtue in it. The mass is
kept up continually in the Catholic Church, and daily in most of their churches.
That is just a continuation of the old Levitical order of having the sacrifices
continually. Some Catholics tell you that is not the case, that the mass is just

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symbolical. If they say that, they deny the very word of their Creed which says it
is a provisory sacrifice.
In one point after another we find that the Catholic Church has continued
the old Levitical order in priests and sacrifices which passed away. We might
read a few of those verses about Jesus’ sacrifice.
“But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat
down on the right hand of God” (Hebrews 10:12).
“It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens
should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with
better sacrifices than these” (Hebrews 9:23).
“Nor yet that he should offer himself often, as the high priest
entereth into the holy place every year with blood of others;
“For then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the
world: but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away
sin by the sacrifice of himself” (Hebrews 9:25, 26).
As it is with the sacrifices, so it is with the Blood. As Jesus’ sacrifice
stands continually, so the Blood is an ever-open Fount flowing freely for sin and
all uncleanness, never ceasing, never failing.
That is what that great song of William Cowper signifies:
“There is a fountain filled with blood
Drawn from Immanuel’s veins;
And sinners, plunged beneath that flood,
Lose all their guilty stains.”
That is our cleansing fountain under this New Dispensation. To symbolize
that under the Old Testament they kept slaying their oxen, their bulls, their goats,
their sheep continually. But it just pointed to that Fount which flows forever.
We have today that body of Christ. That is what the writer has reference to
when he says:
“Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, 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”
(Hebrews 10:5, 6).
What pleasure could there be in it for God or for any true believer, except
as He saw through them the profound truths of God’s world-wide Atonement,
which was an all-sufficient, all-availing Atonement for man kind?
“Then said I, Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of
me,) to do thy will, O God” (Hebrews 10:7).
Another word for “the will of God” is the “law of God.” They are
synonymous terms. Therefore he might have said here, “to do thy law, O God.”

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 “Above when he said, Sacrifice and offering and burnt offerings and
offering for sin thou wouldest not, neither hadst pleasure therein; which
are offered by the law;
“Then said he, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. He taketh away the
first, that he may establish the second” (Hebrews 10:8, 9).
We may say that that first is the Old Covenant and the second is the New
Covenant; because it means a sweeping away of all the old and bringing in the
new to take its place. In Jesus Christ the whole Mosaic covenant is perfectly,
completely fulfilled throughout the countless ages of eternity, including even the
Tabernacle in the wilderness.

Other Types
The Tabernacle was a type of Heaven. We read in Hebrews 9:24:
“For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands,
which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in
the presence of God for us.”
Also in Hebrews 8:1, 2:
“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;
“A minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the
Lord pitched, and not man.”
When the high priest went into the Holy Place on the day of Atonement,
the Israelites congregated around the court on the outside. There, as he
presented the blood of Atonement upon the Mercy Seat, they all worshiped. That
was on the outside. So here, we are the Church of the living God just outside of
the Holy Place, the Holiest of All, and our High Priest has gone in to make an
atonement. We are here worshiping and serving Him, occupying until He comes
as they did in days of old. After he had completed his service he returned to the
people. So our High Priest has gone into the true Tabernacle. He is leaving His
mediatorial Throne one of these days and coming back. We are waiting here for
the great event.
The Israelites in their wanderings in the wilderness and entering Canaan
correspond with the Church in the New Dispensation. Their coming out of Egypt
is a type of justification. Is it true they were all justified? Far from it; but
nevertheless it stands as a type, and their wanderings in the wilderness as a type
of the temptations, trials and the chastenings through which the Christian passes.
The entire congregation of Israel corresponds to the Church of Christ
under the New Covenant. In fact, that is what Stephen called it. He said that
Jesus was the One who was with the church in the wilderness. Therefore we
have a parallel of everything under the Old Covenant with that under the New

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Covenant. The only thing is that while on the one hand it was all temporary and
passing away, under the New it is permanent and eternal.
The Church is eternal, is it not? All its members possess eternal life. There
is the visible and the invisible Church — those who are worshiping God on earth
and those who are worshiping Him before the Throne in Heaven.
Now he continues in this 10th chapter:
“But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat
down on the right hand of God;
“From henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his footstool.
“For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are
sanctified.
“Whereof the Holy Ghost 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 into their hearts, and in their minds will I
write them” (Hebrews 10:12-16).
That thought was quoted from Jeremiah. It is what launched him upon this
question of sanctification which I hope to take up more fully: “For I will forgive
their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more” (Jeremiah 31:34). There was
a constant remembrance of sin through the old Levitical offerings that were
repeated time and time again. But where one sacrifice has been made once and
for all, and the conscience is cleansed, what need is there for further offering for
sins?
This in its very nature indicates that when you and I have the victory God
expects us to keep it; that there shall not be a continual repeating of the
sacrifices and a going down before the Lord, but we will have that thing planted
in the heart that will enable us to stand.
“Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the
blood of Jesus” (Hebrews 10:19).
That is brought into contrast with the way the priest went in because he
was making, as it were, the initial entry into the Holiest of All, and he had to obey
the Law implicitly. A transgression of the Law endangered the priest’s life. He
had bells on his garments so that the people outside would know whether he was
ministering in there or not. But now, Jesus having made a new and a living way
into the true Holy of Holies, we may come boldly and not in fear.
“By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through
the veil, that is to say, his flesh” (Hebrews 10:20).
Those sacrifices were dead sacrifices of the animals; but Christ is a living
sacrifice. It is true He went down to the grave, but the grave never held Him. He
came forth a living sacrifice, and ever liveth to make intercession for us. More
than that, His body never saw corruption.

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 It is stated in the Psalms: “Neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see
corruption” (Psalm 16:10). He came forth without His body suffering the least
taint of corruption — a living sacrifice. That is the very thing which Paul had
reference to when he said in the 12th chapter of Romans: “Present your bodies a
living sacrifice,” in contrast to the dead sacrifices which were offered under the
Old Dispensation.
It is no wonder then that there are so many dead churches in the world
who have forsaken the living sacrifice, who have forsaken the all essential
fundamental truths which are necessary for you and me to be in living contact
with the living God.
“By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through
the veil, that is to say, his flesh.”
His flesh took the place of the veil before the Holy of Holies; and when it
was rent there was a way then open into the Holiest of All. We may enter in, as it
were, by His riven side. Entering into the Holiest of All typifies receiving the
baptism of the Holy Ghost, which marks this Dispensation.
“And having an high priest over the house of God;
“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” (Hebrews 10:21, 22).
I hope that if these studies do nothing more, they will so impress us with
the all-availing Atonement that God has provided for the entire world, that they
will give us a foundation to stand upon in these days. One of the things which
modernism is most viciously attacking is the question of Atonement. That is an
all-vital issue of Christianity. It is our only access to God. It is our only means of
putting ourselves into a position, and having the experience, where we can
receive His law, receive His truths, be built up in the faith, have His
commandments so written upon our hearts that we shall keep them. If the
Atonement is denied, neglected, or forsaken, then we have no entrance at all.

The Doctrine of Sanctification

Explained
___Lesson Fifteen___

Turn to Hebrews the 10th chapter, 21st verse.

“And having an high priest over the house of God;

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 “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 those words the writer about reaches the climax of his doctrinal portion
of the Epistle. In this simple exhortation he has set forth the supreme object of
the Tabernacle service as it is revealed — the spiritual side of it. That was the
sole purpose of the ceremonial Law — that the Israelites might draw near to God.
It was arranged for an approach unto God. And God’s design for us, His purpose
in our lives, is fulfilled just as we draw near unto Him.
The Westminster Catechism has a true question and answer in it: “What is
the chief end of man? Man’s chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.”
Man does not fulfill his divine destiny until he has attained that end.

Drawing Nigh to God

The sole purpose of the Old Testament economy was for that one end:
that God’s people might find Him and might draw nigh unto Him. His idea in
giving the Law was to set forth His righteous standard. He said at one time to the
Israelites that the keeping of those commandments was their righteousness.
Realizing that man was incapable of attaining to that standard, He gave, in
symbolic form, through the Tabernacle and its services, the means by which they
could satisfy the Law.
Throughout these chapters Paul has been unfolding to us the wonderful
significance of those types. They all lead up to the same end: that we in this
dispensation also may draw nigh unto God.
In Ephesians 4:24 we read:
“And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in
righteousness and true holiness.”
And we find a similar verse in Colossians 3:10:
“And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after
the image of him that created him.”
Here we have the aim of God’s plan: the restoration of the image which
was lost in the fall. Man is brought back into his inheritance and into his proper
relationship with God, such as Adam enjoyed before the fall.
A lawyer once came to Jesus and asked Him what was the greatest
commandment. Jesus replied:
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy
soul, and with all thy mind.
“This is the first and great commandment” (Matthew 22:37, 38).
That was not new; He was quoting that from the Old Testament. We find
some of the very highest standards of God’s Word have already been set in the

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Old Testament, then enlarged upon in the New. We examine these Scriptures
and see the relationship which man ought to bear to God. We begin to realize a
little about our high calling in Christ Jesus, that we ought to be devoted to God —
a devotion which exceeds any earthly affection, a devotion which takes
precedence over every other love in the heart; a very fervent love that fills us with
fire, fills us with zeal that keeps us constantly striving for the goal; a love that
causes us to make it our business constantly to serve the Lord, to which
everything else is a side issue and secondary to the one great business of our
life.
Can one find any fault with that? Any one who believes at all in the Bible,
whether he be saint or sinner, is bound to say that that is man’s true relationship
to God, that man ought to give God his all without reservation, make an
unconditional surrender. There must be a yielding up of his will, his own desires,
his own likes, his own ambitions, and absolute surrender so that God can step in
and take the reins to move that man when and where He pleases, and in any
manner in which He pleases.
“Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the
glory of God” (I Corinthians 10:31).
“And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the
Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him” (Colossians 3:17).
“By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God
continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name”
(Hebrews 13:15).
That is taken from the symbol of the altar of incense offered morning and
night.
“Because it is written, Be ye holy; for I am holy” (I Peter 1:16).
“Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is
perfect” (Matthew 5:48).
Every one of those injunctions and exhortations commends itself to our
conscience. We are bound to lend our approval. Whatever fault men may find
with certain teachings or doctrines of the Scriptures, there is one thing certain: if
they have a spark of honesty in them they will lend their approval to every one of
these verses.
We have been studying the Tabernacle. We have seen how beautifully it
was embellished with inlaid gold, precious stones, rich tapestries, and all manner
of expensive artistic work to make it a thing of beauty. The value of the costly
materials employed in the building of the Tabernacle has been estimated at one
and a half million dollars. Then there were the frankincense and the sweet
spices.
Why all this cost? Why all this expenditure of labor? Because that
Tabernacle is the type of the adornment of the true Tabernacle which God wants

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to inhabit — these living temples. It is symbolic of the costly adornment which
God intends His dwelling place to have.
Let us turn to the fourth chapter of the Song of Solomon. This typifies
Christ and His Bride. This is what Christ says concerning His Bride:
“A garden inclosed is my sister, my spouse; a spring shut up, a
fountain sealed.
“Thy plants are an orchard of pomegranates, with pleasant fruits;
camphire, with spikenard,
“Spikenard and saffron; calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of
frankincense; myrrh and aloes, with all the chief spices:
“A fountain of gardens, a well of living waters, and streams from
Lebanon.
“Awake, 0 north wind; and come, thou south; blow upon my garden,
that the spices thereof may flow out” (Song of Solomon 4:12-16).
What do those spices and frankincense here typify? The spiritual
attainments, those precious fruits of the Spirit which God is looking for to be
developed in the life. When we read these things we can see that God is
expecting us to attain to high things. We are to set forth a goal that will cause us
to labor earnestly to reach.

Justification and Sanctification Contrasted

There are strenuous objections raised by many people as to the possibility
of attaining these spiritual attributes. Thousands of men professing Christianity
will say that such a standard is entrely too high; it is out of reach; we cannot
attain unto it.
It would not have been in God’s Word unless God intended it to be
reached, unless God intended us to have these very things that He has set forth
in His Word. That is the reason that by type, by shadow, by precept, by
commandment, by exhortation, step upon step, He has unfolded unto us the plan
by which we may attain unto these spiritual things set forth in His Word.
If it had not been possible, the Psalmist would never have prayed that
prayer we find in the 51st Psalm:
“Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.
“For I acknowledge my transgressions: and my sin is ever before
me.
“Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy
sight: that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest, and be clear
when thou judgest.

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 “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive
me.
“Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts: and in the hidden
part thou shalt make me to know wisdom.
“Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be
whiter than snow.
“Make me to hear joy and gladness; that the bones which thou hast
broken may rejoice.
“Hide thy face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities.
“Create in me a clean heart, 0 God; and renew a right spirit within
me” (Psalm 51:2-10).
The Psalmist was praying (and that was under the Old Testament
dispensation) for a complete deliverance from every taint of sin. If that is not
possible to attain, his prayers are mockery. It can be reached, provided one
comes God’s way, comes and adopts God’s plan. There were men of old who
have. We shall presently find a complete chapter devoted to those who, to a
greater or less degree, had attained unto these things which God held out for
them. It means that God has set down a plan for attaining these things — not
necessarily set forth in definitions of one, two, three, four. Some seem to think
that there ought to be a fixed definition for justification. The Bible is not merely a
systematic theology. It is not a book of definitions. It is a Book of the unfolding of
God’s plan. The writer of Proverbs says:
“Yea, if thou criest after knowledge, and liftest up thy voice for
understanding;
“If thou seekest her as silver, and searchest for her as for hid
treasures;
“Then shalt thou understand the fear of the LORD, and find the
knowledge of God” (Proverbs 2:3-5).
The Lord expects us to dig for these things, to go down into His Word.
A brother said to me one day, “The doctrine of sanctification is not as
clearly set forth in the Scriptures as that of justification.” Naturally not.
Justification is a doctrine that is more or less addressed to the sinner, the man
who is not familiar with God’s Word; therefore God has set forth in comparatively
simple terms how a sinner may become justified by faith. But even that will take
some searching, some honesty of heart, and some digging; but when it comes to
sanctification, it is addressed to those who have had the experience of
justification. God expects them to be able to consecrate deeper.
More than that, they will have their eyes more enlightened to see more of
God’s grace and God’s truth. You and I come to appreciate these marvelous
doctrines and teachings of God’s Word as we have to dig and exert ourselves to
get down to the fundamental truths. It means something to get those fundamental

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truths laid in our heart; not to take the words of some other men, but to know
from God’s Word itself where we stand in these things.
Not all Christian denominations and believers have found these things as
they are set forth in the Word of God. It takes honesty of heart; it takes the
enlightenment of the Spirit; it takes earnestness of purpose; it takes a desire to
know these things for the express purpose that we might draw nigh unto God.
Therefore it is going to take a little digging.
When we come to examine the approach unto God, the very first fact we
come into contact with is that of sin and the need of an Atonement. Therefore,
before an entry into the Holy Place at all is open, there stands the brazen altar.
The very first sacrifice that is made is the offering for sins. That leads all other
sacrifices, and it is set forth in Exodus 30:10.
“And Aaron shall make an atonement upon the horns of it once in a
year with the blood of the sin offering of atonements: once in the year shall
he make atonement upon it throughout your generations: it is most holy
unto the LORD.”
There was the sin offering on the Day of Atonement. This was a general
offering, not for any particular individual, but it was all-comprehensive. In other
words, right at the very beginning God sets forth in the sin offering the great fact,
the necessity of an Atonement before there is any approach at all unto Him. That
sin offering symbolizes the all-comprehensive Atonement which God has made
for the entire world. It was not for the individual; the trespass offering was
brought by the individual. It was the individual offering that they had to make for
their own sins. This Atonement is symbolized by the offering that was made once
a year, just as we in our dispensation symbolize the Lord’s death every so often
by the breaking of bread and engaging in the Lord’s Supper. It did show forth
great Atonement, the world-wide Atonement — that is, it eventually became
world-wide.
The Atonement was kept ever before them; there was no other way of
approach unto God. The same thing was set forth when John saw Jesus coming
down toward the banks of Jordan, and he cried: “Behold the Lamb of God, which
taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).
“The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold
the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.” [That was the
world-wide atonement.]
Then in I John 3:8:
“For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might
destroy the works of the devil.”
The works of the devil are sin and all its consequences. There is set forth
the great Atonement, which brings to each individual the necessity for pardon
and the need for cleansing. That is all set forth in the 51st Psalm. David opens
that Psalm by saying:

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 “Have mercy upon me, 0 God, according to thy lovingkindness:
according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my
transgressions. [This is in the plural.]
“Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin
[Singular] (Psalm 51:1, 2).
There we have the outward transgressions and the inward principle that
he was seeking deliverance from, set forth in the Old Testament. That is why we
maintain that they had the experience of sanctification under the Old Testament
dispensation.
“Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is
covered.
“Blessed is the man unto whom the LORD imputeth not iniquity, and
in whose spirit there is no guile” (Psalm 32:1, 2).
There you have the two things: pardon; and a spirit without guile, the
result of sanctifcation.
Again in I John 1:9:
“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins,
[Plural] and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness [Singular].”
There you have the two needs set forth in that verse which is quoted so
frequently. In the Old Testament types we have this twofold remedy for sin set
forth in the sacrifices in Leviticus 6:
“If a soul sin, and commit a trespass against the LORD, and lie unto
his neighbour in that which was delivered him to keep, or in fellowship, or
in a thing taken away by violence, or hath deceived his neighbour;
“Or have found that which was lost, and lieth concerning it, and
sweareth falsely; in any of all these that a man doeth, sinning therein:
“Then it shall be, because he hath sinned, and is guilty, that he shall
restore that which he took violently away, or the thing which he hath
deceitfully gotten, or that which was delivered him to keep, or the lost thing
which he found,
“Or all that about which he hath sworn falsely; he shall even restore
it in the principal, and shall add the fifth part more thereto, [There you have
restitution and approach to God.] and give it unto him to whom it
appertaineth, in the day of his trespass offering” (Leviticus 6:2-5).
It was necessary that he not only make restitution but he had something
else to do.
“And he shall bring his trespass offering unto the LORD, a ram
without blemish out of the flock, with thy estimation, for a trespass
offering, unto the priest:

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 “And the priest shall make an atonement for him before the LORD:
and it shall be forgiven him for any thing of all that he hath done in
trespassing therein” (Leviticus 6:6, 7).
There the entire approach to God for justification is set forth. This was the
individual trespass offering which was brought. These Israelites, when they came
to God, were to look beyond that offering. They were to see it only as a symbol of
God’s recognition that the Blood of Atonement would blot out their transgression
when they came in heartfelt repentance.
Read David’s prayer and you will find that it is full of heartfelt repentance.
He shed bitter tears. He went down to the bottom of that thing. If more of the
Israelites had been of David’s order there would have been fewer rebellions in
Israel. There would have been less backsliding. There would have been more
joy. There would have been peace in the nation. They would have prospered,
because God had promised it to them. They would have continued in the
Promised Land. But because they failed to measure up and come by the
provisions which God had ordained, there was rebellion; there was backsliding,
and finally total apostasy.

A Type of Sanctification
Immediately following the trespass offering came the burnt offering. That
is described particularly in Exodus 29:18:
“And thou shalt burn the whole ram upon the altar: it is a burnt
offering unto the LORD: it is a sweet savour, an offering made by fire unto
the LORD.”
No sinner could bring that offering; only the one who had first brought the
trespass offering and had his sins forgiven brought this burnt offering. Paul gives
us a splendid explanation of this in Romans 12:1:
“I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye
present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is
your reasonable service.”
Or we might say “spiritual service.” He says “a living sacrifice” against the
“dead sacrifices” of the Old Covenant. He says a spiritual service here, setting it
over against the symbolic service of the Tabernacle. Therefore we have here the
true significance of that burnt offering: an offering of ourselves unto God. What
was significant of this burnt offering? It was placed there upon the altar and left
until it was entirely consumed.
The fire upon the altar had been kindled miraculously. As they had laid
their sacrifice there, they prayed and looked to God, and the fire descended and
consumed the sacrifice. After that initial calling down of the fire, they were given
instructions in Leviticus that that fire was to be kept burning continuously — it
was never to go out. It was the coals from that altar which they took into the
Tabernacle to burn their incense.

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 It was kindled exactly as Elijah’s was when he was on Mount Carmel and
prayed down the fire from Heaven. It fell and consumed the sacrifice. The reason
Aaron’s sons were struck dead was that they took strange fire into the
Tabernacle. It did not come from the altar as God had ordained.
There upon the altar the entire sacrifice was consumed. What spiritual
significance has that? An entire yielding up of the heart and life to God that it
might be a sweet-smelling savor unto Him. That typified sanctification. It was
always made with the shedding of blood.
“And thou shalt burn the whole ram upon the altar: it is a burnt
offering unto the LORD: it is a sweet savour, an offering made by fire unto
the LORD” (Exodus 29:18).
That is a beautiful type of the offering up of the life unto God.
Another type in the Old Testament of sanctification is the rite of
circumcision. We are told in Deuteronomy 30:6 what is the significance of that
rite, just as plainly as anyone would want it:
“And the LORD thy God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of
thy seed, to love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy
soul, that thou mayest live.”
There you have the entire thing in a nutshell. Jesus’ commandment was
the same as is set forth here. How are we to obey that first commandment?
Through a second, definite work of grace by which God’s love is perfected in the
heart. There you have the fulfillment of the Law, the fulfillment of the great
commandment.
Is it any wonder that Mother Crawford used to say that sanctification is the
hub of the Christian experience? When Jeremiah, in speaking of the New
Covenant, said that God should write the law upon their hearts, he was getting
down to the very kernel of the whole situation of how the law of God was to be
kept. That is through the perfecting of love in the heart. If that love of God, by
God’s second definite work of grace, is put into the heart — it goes beyond the
bounds of human love then it is not going to be hard to keep His commandments.
If we love the Lord with all our heart, soul, mind and strength, it is not
going to be hard to serve Him, to do what He has commanded; especially when
He imparts His supernatural power to us to enable us to live up to those
commandments and precepts. That is why Peter says that God’s
commandments are not grievous.
“In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made
without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the
circumcision of Christ” (Colossians 2:11).
That carries us over to the verse we have already quoted in Hebrews
which reads:

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 “For the bodies of those beasts, whose blood is brought into the
sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned without the camp”
(Hebrews 13:11).
The taking of the body of those beasts outside the camp was putting off
the body of sin. It is fulfilled in II Corinthians 7:1:
“Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse
ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in
the fear of God.”
Here is entire sanctification — perfecting holiness. That means that it is
complete with nothing wanting. Again in I Thessalonians 5:23:
“And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your
whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of
our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Is not that entire sanctification without a vestige of sin being left?

The Sinless Bride

“Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church,
and gave himself for it;
“That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by
the word,
“That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having
spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without
blemish” (Ephesians 5:25-27).
There you have the church of Christ, what Christ expects that Church to
be when He comes back to this earth to catch away His waiting Bride, without
spot or wrinkle. It should be holy and without a blemish.
In Christ’s intercessory prayer in John 17, we read:
“Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe
on me through their word” (John 17:20).
That reaches down through the ages to our time, to every one who shall
believe on Christ through the word of these disciples for whom He was praying.
“That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, [That same
oneness that we find in the Godhead which goes beyond our
comprehension] and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: [The Bride is
taken in with the oneness of the Godhead.] that the world may believe that
thou hast sent me” (John 17:21).
And how is the world to believe that? It is believed by the oneness of the
children of God: a people in whom and among whom there are no schisms, no
differences of belief, no heretical doctrines brought in, no strange teaching to

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which they lend an ear, but all are of one accord. If we are to fulfill our mission in
this world it will be because we preserve that kind of sanctification.
“And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they
may be one, even as we are one” (John 17:22).
Those are the words of the Lord Jesus Christ. See how perfectly they
agree with the words of the Apostle Paul in Hebrews 2:11:
“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.”

The Destruction of the “Old Man”

We are given in Romans 6 a plain illustration of the relation that
justification bears to sanctification. It will do us good to have that well fixed in our
minds and hearts.
“For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we
shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:
“Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, . . .
(Romans 6:5, 6).
That is another name for the carnal nature.
It is called the body of sin, the old man, the carnal mind; and sometimes it
is known as the flesh. It all means one and the same thing : the principles of sin
within man from which come forth all his evil acts. We read in some of those
other verses about putting on the new man. Before that new man can be put on,
the old man must be put off. Before there can be any positive work, there must
be a negative work. The negative work is the destruction of sin; the positive work
is a growing in grace.
The order in which they come is first that sin shall be utterly destroyed
before there can be any positive work or growth in grace. You can see how
completely a people who fail of true holiness and sanctification fail of the
perfection which God has for them. There can be no perfection such as God has
set forth in His Word until first of all sin is absolutely dispensed with in the heart
and life.
“. . . that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be
destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.”
That is taken from the figure of Christ’s crucifixion. Christ was nailed upon
the cross about the third hour, 9:00 o’clock in the morning, and He remained
there until the ninth hour which was 3:00 o’clock in the afternoon. From the
moment that He was nailed to the cross, death set in; but there came at the ninth
hour an instant in which death ensued and He cried that it was finished, and
committed His soul unto the Father and died. That was instantaneous.

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 Paul draws a parallel here: when one is justified, death begins — death to
sin, death to the carnal nature. But it has not been completed yet. There is a
measure of holiness even in justification when that carnal nature receives a
stunning blow and is no longer able to operate. That is why babes in Christ have
joy overflowing if they receive a genuine experience of justification. The carnal
nature, though not dead, has received a blow that has rendered it absolutely
inactive. But from that moment God speaks to the babe in Christ to move on to
the point where death shall ensue. That may be in five minutes, five weeks, five
months, or it might be five years. But whatever the length of time it takes, that
course and the result are the same.
If that seeker presses on for his fullness in Christ there is going to come a
time, an instant, in which death to sin takes place; and that is entire
sanctification. When Jesus expired He was not partly dead: He was entirely
dead; He had passed into the veil of death. That is what Paul means when he
says in Galatians 2:20:
“I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ
liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the
Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.”
Here you have a panoramic view of Paul’s life: that he no longer lived, but
it was Christ who lived in him. From henceforth he lived by the faith of the Son of
God who loved him and gave Himself for him. One who has gone through that
experience is brought into a new plane of life.
The burning of that incense in the Holy Place morning and night
symbolized constant prayer ascending unto the Father. We also found that the
Holy Place symbolizes the position of the sanctified heart. The soul who has
been sanctified resides where the lamp is lit, signifying the enlightenment of the
Holy Ghost. The Word of God is his food; and the incense is constantly rising
from the golden altar. Henceforth he is in that sphere of life.

Christian Perfection
You can begin to realize what sanctification means. Having had this work
wrought out he is ready for the positive work of perfection in this Holy Place. You
remember what the writer of Hebrews said:
“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).
Having had that work, then move on into perfection, not doing the same
thing over and over as they repeated these symbols in the Old Testament.
Having had it wrought, move on into that place where we can grow in grace.
“Let us go forth therefore unto him without the camp, bearing his
reproach.
“For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come.

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 “By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God
continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name”
(Hebrews 13:13-15).
That is the wonderful provision which God has made by which we enter
into that Holy Place.
There is a great dispute about this question of entire sanctification. Some
people claim to believe in sanctification, but they will not believe that it is possible
to be rid of every vestige of sin; but if we believe the Word of God, we will have to
believe it.
Even a sanctified person makes mistakes as long as he lives; but
mistakes of judgment and mistakes through ignorance are not sin. (Some people
have a wrong conception of what is the Bible definition of sin.) The best of men
are likely to make mistakes, and that in practice as well as in judgment. But such
mistakes are not sin, if love is the sole principle of action. No matter to what
stage of grace one has risen he needs that Blood over him continually.
Suppose I come into contact with a stranger and he tells me a story that to
my mind is believable and I accept it, and it gives me a high regard for his
character; but subsequent events prove that I was entirely mistaken. He
deceived me, and I find that my judgment has been bad. That is just my lack, my
dullness, my inability to see what kind of character I was dealing with. These
things occur even with men of high spiritual standing who have attained high
grace. You will find many people not familiar with the Bible who will have a
standard concerning sin that is absolutely unattainable. Then when one claims to
be without sin he applies his own definition immediately. Thus, they reason, that
no man can get rid of all sin.
Herein was Christ different from all other men, even the most devout. He
made no mistakes of judgment, nor mistakes through ignorance. Christ never
had to retract a thing He said. He never had to seek forgiveness for the things He
did, though in dealing with those Pharisees who were heckling Him and
constantly trying to entrap Him, He used some of the severest language. “In
whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Colossians 2:3). That
cannot be said of any man. Jesus said, “For I do always those things that please
him” (John 8:29). You and I cannot always attain unto that standard, always to do
those things that please the Father. But there is one thing that we can have, and
that is the purpose in our hearts to do it.
We shall fall short; we shall have poor judgment sometimes; we shall
displease Him through ignorance, but nevertheless we can have a perfect heart.
As I understand that, it is a heart that always has the purpose to do that which
pleases God. It is possible for every one of us to have such a purpose of heart.
Some persons, in judging a Christian, include as many ingredients as they
please in their estimation, whether those ingredients are according to Scripture or
not, and readily denounce anyone who does not answer to their imaginary idea.

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 John Wesley sums up what Christian perfection is: “Pure love reigning
alone in the heart and life: this is the whole of scriptural perfection.” Prophecies
shall cease, tongues shall be no more; there will be a time when we shall not
need even to exercise faith. Knowledge shall be done away with. But the love of
God will continue through the countless ages of eternity. Let us see to it that we
perfect it in our lives.

Presumptuous Sin
___Lesson Sixteen___
In the 10th chapter of Hebrews we come to the close of the doctrinal
portion of Paul’s writings; and from the 23rd verse on, we have another one of
those stern warnings. It is similar to the one in the 6th chapter where he was
speaking of those who had been enlightened and had tasted of the good Word of
God, and the power of another world: that if they should fall away, it would be
impossible to renew them. That verse of Scripture in the 6th chapter, as well as
these verses in the 10th chapter, has been a source of trouble to some believers
— something of a mystery to them.
Many who are of a doubtful frame of mind, like Thomas, seem to think that
they come within the class pointed out in the following verses. It is, therefore, a
good thing to get thoroughly fixed in our mind whom Paul has in view when he is
writing on this subject.
“Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he
is faithful that promised;)
“And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good
works:
“Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner
of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see
the day approaching.
“For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of
the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins” (Hebrews 10:23-26).
In view of what we know about other portions of God’s Word, as well as of
what we know about the experience of believers, we will have to conclude that
Paul is speaking here about a certain class of sin — not sin in general, but the
kind of sin that this passage of Scripture alone can cover.
We have seen that in the Old Testament sacrifices nearly every manner of
sin was covered by the trespass offering which the sinner brought. That offering
availed for his sins in case he had lied, defrauded, or stolen. Nearly the whole
category of sin was covered by this offering.

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 Because we are told that if we sin wilfully after we have received a
knowledge of the truth, many think there is no possibility of returning to the Lord.
Correspondents frequently write to our office and want to know if there is a
possibility of a man’s being renewed if he has fallen away after he has received
his experiences, especially the baptism of the Holy Ghost. There certainly is. We
know it from personal experience as well as from the Word of God. Therefore this
covers something which does not come under the classification of ordinary sin.
When Paul says, “If any man sin wilfully,” he means sinning wilfully in the
particular class of sin of which he is speaking here. From what he says afterward
we now understand that what Paul is dealing with is that sin of denying the faith,
of turning from the faith, forsaking the whole plan of redemption which God has
laid down for mankind. For that man there remains no longer a sacrifice for sin.
He has rejected his very means of approach to God in denying the faith. In
denying the faith he denies the power of Atonement.
Then he goes on to bring out a comparison between that kind of sin and
the punishment that was meted out to one who set at naught Moses’ Law. That
was a similar sin.
“But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation,
which shall devour the adversaries.
“He that despised Moses’ law died without mercy under 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, and hath counted the
blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and
hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace?” (Hebrews 10:27-29).
That defines the kind of sin of which Paul is speaking here: looking with
contempt upon the very means of grace which God has provided through the
sanctifying Blood. Thus he has done despite to the Spirit of grace. That is the sin
of which Jesus spoke when He said: “And whosoever shall speak a word against
the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but unto him that blasphemeth against
the Holy Ghost it shall not beforgiven” (Luke 12:10). This is the sin with which the
Apostle is dealing.
In the Old Testament we have a passage of Scripture that corresponds to
this; it is found in Numbers 15. We are told about the trespass offering and the
different offerings which must be brought for sins committed — even sins of
ignorance.
When one came to a knowledge of having sinned, even though it was
through ignorance, he had to bring a trespass offering for that thing.
“But the soul that doeth ought presumptuously, whether he be born
in the land, or a stranger, the same reproacheth the LORD; and that soul
shall be cut off from among his people.

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 “Because he hath despised the word of the LORD, and hath broken
his commandment, that soul shall utterly be cut off; his iniquity shall be
upon him” (Numbers 15:30, 31).
In other words, there is no sacrifice available for him. He is cut off from
Israel. The adjective “presumptuous” is defined as “unduly self confident.” It
refers to one who assumes a position and arrogantly maintains it without
sufficient grounds. To my mind that is a very good description of people who
have forsaken the Gospel. You will find them taking on that attitude immediately,
especially those who have turned to something false and crooked. Then
presumptuous sin may be defined thus: scorning God’s commandments and
wilfully breaking them through contempt for His plan of redemption — substituting
a lie for the truth. For such there remains no longer a sacrifice for sin.
That was the very kind of sin which David prayed about when he said:
“Keep back thy servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion
over me: then shall I be upright, and I shall be innocent from the great
transgression” (Psalm 19:13).
A transgression that shuts you out from the atoning merits of Jesus Christ
is certainly a transgression above all others. We see, therefore, that there is a
dividing line between ordinary backsliding and this sin of which Paul is speaking,
and which is also mentioned elsewhere in Scripture. This is the unpardonable sin
of which Jesus spoke. It is that sin unto death of which John spoke. It is the
presumptuous sin of the Old Testament. That is the sin for which there remains
no longer a sacrifice.
Any sin that scorns God’s plan, that turns away from it, and has no faith in
it, is in that classification. You will notice that Paul particularly speaks of those
who have been enlightened, those who have tasted of the good Word, those who
have trodden under foot the Son of God and have counted the Blood of the
Covenant, wherewith they were sanctified, an unholy thing. In other words, those
who have experienced His saving grace and then have renounced the means of
grace.
I have heard sinners say they had no faith whatever in the Gospel or in the
plan of redemption — sinners, who had never experienced any of God’s saving
grace. But when a man has had that experience and then can say such a thing,
that man is close to the deadline, if indeed he has not gone over it.
When Paul was writing to the Galatians he said:
“I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into
the grace of Christ unto another gospel” (Galatians 1:6).
He had a right to marvel, because these Galatians had received the truth
and were saved. That is something that is far beyond secondhand testimony, far
beyond any hearsay, or simply what we get by reading the Bible. There is a
testimony that is laid in the very depths of one’s being. If one has received a
definite experience from the Lord he is so sure of it that neither men nor devils
should ever be able to rob him of the knowledge that he has received it.

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 That is why Paul, in writing to the Galatians, could say that he marveled
that they were so soon turned away. Then how about the man who has
experienced these things and then by disobedience can reach the point where he
denies even the Blood that bought him? There remaineth no longer a sacrifice for
that man.
“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, and
hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace?” (Hebrews 10:29).
When it comes to sinning, it is the motive which prompts it that determines
one’s guilt. Sometimes men fall under a strong temptation that assails them; but
they never waver concerning God’s truth, His saving grace, His promises of
atonement. There is every hope for that man to return. But when, on the other
hand, a man sins contemptuously and presumptuously because he scorns God’s
plan and has no longer any faith in it and says there is nothing to it, that man’s
sin is very different from the other man’s.

Apostatizing
There is a decided line of demarcation between backsliding and
apostatizing. That does not mean that there are allowances made for back-
sliding, or that the Lord tolerates it at all, for it is condemned by Him. But
backsliding is not necessarily apostatizing. There is one thing that the Apostle
warns these Hebrews against and that is a continual wavering and backsliding. If
they did, they were in danger of reaching the place of apostasy through repeated
backslidings.
Repeated failures can bring a man to a point where he will apostatize. The
Hebrew Christians were forsaking the assembling of themselves. They were not
doing it simply out of carelessness, or because they were discouraged, or
disheartened, but because some of them perhaps were losing faith in God’s
saving power.
“For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I
will recompense, saith the Lord. And again, The Lord shall judge his
people.
“It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God”
(Hebrews 10:30, 31).
That means the God of judgment. Man has his choice of two things: either
God’s judgment or God’s mercy.
“But call to remembrance the former days, in which, after ye were
illuminated, ye endured a great fight of afflictions” (Hebrews 10:32).
The Hebrew Christians had evidently come through much. We have
evidence that this church of Judea was persecuted to a great degree, perhaps
more than any other church. Through the persecutions that were assailing them

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upon one hand, and the enticement to Judaism upon the other hand, there was
danger of their apostatizing completely.
“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.
“Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath great
recompence of reward” (Hebrews 10:33-35).
This goes deeper than merely one’s being assailed by doubts. Doubts will
come to any true believer and he will often have conflicts over the question of his
own experience. I presume every one of us has gone through that, being
assailed on every hand by the enemy who sets up a regular bombardment
against us. After an attack of that nature, he begins to insert doubts and
questions as to our experiences. But what Paul is speaking of goes beyond that:
“casting away confidence” to the extent of having no confidence in God’s plan of
salvation.
“For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of
God, ye might receive the promise” (Hebrews 10:36).
Sometimes we will have purposed to line up to God’s will, and have
watched our step and have known that we are measuring up in all things, and yet
something for which we have entreated the Lord and prayed for has not come to
pass. We know that we have done the Lord’s will; that, so far as we know,
nothing is standing in the way. Why then does not the Lord act? Here we have
the answer:
“For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of
God, ye might receive the promise.”
The Lord will probably allow a little stretch of time to interpose just to see
whether we are going to hold on in faith before He fulfills His side of it. He has a
right to do that.
“For yet a little while, and he that shall come will come, and will not
tarry” (Hebrews 10:37).
See how He was trying to bring a little consolation to these Hebrews:
warning them on the one hand, and then bringing them comfort on the other
hand that they might have reawakened within them that fervent faith and hope
that in the beginning filled their hearts.
We are living in days when we need to keep the fire burning upon the altar
of our hearts; when we need fervency of spirit. If we find ourselves growing
indifferent or unconcerned about the cause of Christ, it is a good time to seek the
Lord, and renew our vows and see that the fire continues to burn.

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 “Now the just shall live by faith: [It is a living faith, not a dead faith.]
but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him.
“But we are not of them who draw back unto perdition; but of them
that believe to the saving of the soul” (Hebrews 10:38, 39).
There is a solemn warning in those words that every one of us can take.
We are probably a long way from any spirit of apostatizing, but it shows the
necessity of living close to the Lord. We have found through this Epistle that Paul
has emphasized the plan of approach unto God that we might live close to Him,
and like Enoch of old, we might walk with Him.

Old Testament Feasts

___Lesson Seventeen___

It has been requested that we review the Old Testament annual feasts. It
is right in line with our present studies. The Epistle to the Hebrews shows how
the Old Testament in every particular has its fulfillment in the New. One blends
into the other. The Old Testament institutions thrill my heart when I see their
fulfillment in the New. It makes the Word of God more sacred, especially as we
see the space of centuries that it covers and how God, from the very beginning,
planned it all.
Nothing was non-essential. Nothing was thrown in without its significance.
Again you can see how God stooped to the limitations of the human mind in the
use of types and shadows. Suppose He had put it in theological form and had set
it forth as many of you have seen in a book of theology. How applicable would
that have been to mankind as a whole? It would perhaps be a fair diet for a few
theologians, but how about the man in the ordinary walks of life? It would not
show him the way of salvation. God, therefore, has put it in types and figures and
object lessons for the very purpose that the beauty of the lessons might be
brought home to the heart of each and every one of us.

The Passover
In addition to the Tabernacle service, instituted under the Old Testament
Law, we find certain annual feasts. We are very familiar with the first one of
these: the Passover, the institution of which is set forth in Exodus 12. It was
ordained after Moses had returned with Aaron to the land of Egypt and had
presented their petitions time and again to Pharaoh for the release of the
Children of Israel. Pharaoh hardened his heart in every instance.
The statement that “the LORD hardened Pharaoh’s heart,” need not
trouble you in the least, because this means that He simply permitted

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Pharaoh to harden his own heart. Because he was Inclined that way, the Lord let
him do it.
Finally, after these plagues had been sent one after another in increasing
intensity and severity, the Lord spoke to Moses and decreed a final judgment to
come upon Egypt.
“And the LORD spake unto Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt,
saying,
“This month shall be unto you the beginning of months: it shall be
the first month of the year to you” (Exodus 12:1, 2).
That was the month Abib. It had not been the beginning of their year
previous to that. Their calendar year began in the fall. That was known as their
civil year and this was their religious calendar. The latter was the one that all their
worship and religious ordinances were governed by. So important was this
deliverance out of Egypt that the Lord commemorated it by changing their
calendar.
“Speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying, In the tenth day
of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to the
house of their fathers, a lamb for an house:
“And if the household be too little for the lamb, let him and his
neighbour next unto his house take it according to the number of the
souls; every man according to his eating shall make your count for the
lamb” (Exodus 12:3, 4).
This is the first instance of the shedding of blood in all the judgments that
were visited upon Egypt, the first sacrifice that was made.
“Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year: ye shall
take it out from the sheep, or from the goats:
“And ye shall keep it up until the fourteenth day of the same month:
and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the
evening.
“And they shall take of the blood, and strike it on the two side posts
and on the upper door post of the houses, wherein they shall eat it”
(Exodus 12:5-7).
But not upon the threshold! It was not to be trodden under foot. It was
applied in every house. We had in our last lesson the sin offering setting forth the
great Atonement; but that was not all. It was not only necessary to have a
sacrifice pre-figuring the great Atonement, but it was also necessary to have a
trespass offering making the sacrifice personally applicable.
Some people think that because Jesus Christ died upon Calvary’s Cross
and made an atonement for the whole world (which He did) that in some general
way they are included in that Atonement. No, they are not unless they experience
a personal application of the Blood.

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 The offering of the bullock upon the altar made once a year by the high
priest never alone availed as an atonement for Israel. They had to come
individually with their trespass offering for their own sins. They slew a lamb for
every household, and then applied the blood to the doorposts.
“And they shall eat the flesh in that night, roast with fire, and
unleavened bread; and with bitter herbs they shall eat it.
“Eat not of it raw, nor sodden at all with water, but roast with fire; his
head with his legs, and with the purtenance thereof.
“And ye shall let nothing of it remain until the morning; and that
which remaineth of it until the morning ye shall burn with fire.
“And thus shall ye eat it; with your loins girded, your shoes on your
feet, and your staff in your hand; and ye shall eat it in haste: it is the
LORD’S passover” (Exodus 12:8-11).
That was because of the impending judgment that was to come upon the
Egyptians. Israel was to hasten out of that land where the judgment was falling,
as is indicated by the next verse.
“For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all
the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the
gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am the LORD” (Exodus 12:12).
The Lord was not only displaying His own great power, but was at the
same time showing the utter futility of trusting the gods upon which the Egyptians
were leaning; they could not and did not protect them. Nearly every plague that
was sent against Egypt was directed against their gods.
Pharaoh went down early in the morning and stood before the river Nile.
The river Nile was an object of worship. It was a source of life. He went there to
worship, and saw that the waters were turned to blood. God struck at one of their
objects of worship.
The hail came and smote their cattle which they worshiped. They could
see throughout all those judgments that were falling that their own gods were
furnishing them no protection. Thus the Lord was given the glory instead of the
gods of the Egyptians.
“And the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where ye
are: and when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and the plague shall not
be upon you to destroy you, when I smite the land of Egypt.
“And this day shall be unto you for a memorial; and ye shall keep it a
feast to the LORD throughout your generations; ye shall keep it a feast by
an ordinance for ever” (Exodus 12:13, 14).
The Passover was kept to commemorate their deliverance out of Egypt;
and that became the great landmark from this time on in Israel. Their songs of
praise, their prophecies, and their historical writings orientate in this deliverance

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out of Egypt; it all looked back to that memorable night when the Lord stretched
out His mighty hand and smote the first born in the land of Egypt.
It all has its typical significance. The lamb without blemish was explained
when John stood upon the banks of Jordan and saw that lone Figure
approaching, and he cried, “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin
of the world” (John 1:29). He was fulfilling that ordinance which for centuries the
Israelites had observed as God had commanded: the Passover. The Lamb of
God had come into the world. We have further Scriptural authority in I
Corinthians 5:7 for saying that this slain lamb prefigured Jesus Christ:
‘Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye
are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us.”
Christ became our Passover. We have under the New Dispensation the
observance of the Lord’s Supper, typifying Christ’s death, giving His body and
Blood for our redemption.
It is also found in I Peter 1:18, 19:
“Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible
things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by
tradition from your fathers;
“But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish
and without spot.”
That is striking at what many of the Hebrews or the Jews were leaning
upon: their own traditions. That was what Jesus condemned them for, that they
had substituted their traditions for the commandments of God. There are many
today who are doing that thing. They have a long string of traditions. The way
their parents and their great-grandparents worshiped before them, church
ordinances, and church ceremonies, have become traditions which they now
worship more than they do God Himself.
You can see why they were to be so particular in selecting that lamb. It
was to be a type of the Lamb who had no spot or blemish. The blood applied to
the doorposts and the lintels signifies a personal application — it must be over
every heart.
Our dwellings today are these “temples of clay,” our bodies in which we
reside; and the Blood has to be, as it were, upon the “doorposts and lintels” of
our dwellings. This was the token and security against the judgment that was
falling in the land of Egypt.
We are on the very threshold of another period of judgments, and they are
falling rapidly; they are coming nearer home every day. What is our security?
Just the same security that the Israelites had: the Blood of the Passover Lamb.
Moses might just as well have said to those Israelites what Paul says to us today
as we observe the Lord’s Supper: “For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink
this cup, ye do shew the Lord’s death till he come” (1 Corinthians 11:26). Moses
might have said, “As often as ye slay this lamb and shed his blood, ye do

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foreshow the Lord’s death till He come.” That is history now. He has come — His
first coming — and the old ordinance of the Passover has ceased. But we are
looking ahead now to another coming, and we are showing His death till He
come.

Strength Through Obedience

The whole lamb was to be eaten. That lamb signifies the broken body and
the shed Blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. When we go into the ordinance every
child of God is expected to discern the body of the Lord Jesus Christ in that
ordinance — not merely in a mental way, but spiritually. There we have typified
through those emblems the broken body and the shed Blood of the Lord Jesus
Christ.
In Matthew 26:26-28 we read:
“And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and
brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body.
“And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying,
Drink ye all of it;
“For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many
for the remission of sins.”
And again in John 6:53:
“Then Jesus said unto them, 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.”
That caused an offense in His day, and still does in ours. There are those
who want to get away from that kind of religion; they do not want to have a thing
to do with a “blood” religion.
Then he goes on to give an explanation of what he meant.
“It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words
that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63).
There you have the incarnate Word which Job said was more necessary
than his daily food. He would rather go hungry, miss a meal now and then, than
to miss the Word of God.
In the 105th Psalm we read:
“He brought them forth also with silver and gold: and there was not
one feeble person among their tribes” (Psalm 105:37).
They went out in the strength of the lamb upon which they fed: the young,
the middle-aged, and the old. There was not a feeble one among them. It gave
them not only natural strength; it gave them supernatural strength. And in just the
same way the Word of God today supports and sustains us physically as well as
spiritually.

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 Moses said to the Israelites that the keeping of those commandments was
their life; and what he said to them he says to us today: it is our life. When we
begin to grow indifferent to it we will become feeble, we will become weakened
— often physically as well as spiritually.
The Children of Israel went through those forty years in the wilderness,
and how God sustained them! The Word says that not even their clothing or
shoes waxed old. They were sustained by God’s power. Every one of those three
million or more people in the wilderness would have come into the Promised
Land had they stood true to God and kept His commandments, and not fallen
into murmuring and allowed unbelief to come in and rob them of their goal.

The Bitter with the Sweet

In this we have the significance of the whole lamb. That whole lamb
means the whole Word of God. That was something new to me when I came into
the Apostolic Faith church. I believed in practically all the Word, and I believed
that there was salvation there, for anyone; but in the matter of healing, I thought it
was optional as to whether one took advantage of it or not. But I received new
light when I came into contact with this church, and I saw that it was obligatory
upon me to accept divine healing; that it was not optional at all. So it is with every
one of us: we are obligated to accept that whole Word and everything that it
provides from start to finish.
You and I cannot say, “I’ll leave out this and I’ll take that.” Christ is not
divided. That Bible is the incarnate Word. Therefore, it must be taken just as it
stands without anything removed or left out. We have many warnings in the Word
of God of what it means to take from it or add to it.
Paul tells us what the unleavened bread stood for.
“Therefore let us keep the feast, [Here he is referring to the Lord’s
Supper. We have this ordinance taking the place of the Passover of old.]
not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but
with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth” (I Corinthians 5:8).
We have, then, in leaven a type of sin, its corruption. A process of
fermentation produces leaven; and that throughout the Bible is taken as a type of
sin. Therefore they were to observe this sacrifice without even a trace of leaven.
So particular were the Jews in observing this provision that on the day of
preparation for the Passover they went through every corner and cranny of their
houses and swept them carefully lest there should be one particle of leaven
anywhere.
How typical of the way we should come in observing the Lord’s Supper:
sweeping, in a spiritual sense, every corner of our being, lest there be any
leaven, or any particle of sin to disqualify us for the ordinance! The unleavened
bread signifies a total absence of sin in every manner, shape, and form.

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 Then the bitter herbs: we have nothing in Scripture to interpret this; but
most Bible students are agreed that it signified the bitter bondage they had in the
land of Egypt. Yearly they had set before them a reminder of what they had had
in Egypt, the bitterness they had gone through. When they came into the
wilderness they went through some hard places, too; but the Lord wanted them
to be reminded of a bitterness that was greater than that.
There are in the Word of God the bitter things as well as the sweet. You
and I will encounter them before we finish our course. We are not launched upon
a pleasure excursion when we start out to serve the Lord. But we are reminded in
one of the Psalms that to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet. Why not
take the bitter with the sweet when we know that it is perfecting us and bringing
us to that point that Jesus Christ wants attained by every child of God?
The Children of Israel had a constant reminder of the bitterness through
which they had passed. Had the older members of that nation remembered a
little better they might have walked more carefully in the wilderness. It is a good
thing for us to remember the hole of the pit from which we were digged and the
rock from which we were hewn.
This lamb was to be eaten in haste. How wonderfully like the words which
we find in Luke 12:35, 36! You remember they were to eat it with their loins
girded, with their shoes upon their feet, and their staff in their hand; they were to
eat it in haste because of the judgments that were falling. Here we have the
words in Luke:
“Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning;
“And ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their lord, when he
will return from the wedding.”
We are very much in the position in these days that the Israelites were in,
as it were, with our shoes on, our staff in our hand, our loins girded and ready to
go out. That at least is the readiness we ought to be in. If we begin to lay aside
our staffs or do not have our loins girded, and begin to take it a little complacently
in this life, we need to take heed. We are watchmen upon the walls; we are
watching not only for the coming of the Lord, but we are watching constantly
against the inroads of the enemy.

The Feast of Weeks

“Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be
come into the land which I give unto you, and shall reap the harvest
thereof, then ye shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest unto the
priest:
“And he shall wave the sheaf before the LORD, to be accepted for
you: on the morrow after the sabbath the priest shall wave it”
(Leviticus 23:10, 11).
That was the offering of the firstfruits.

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 “And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the sabbath,
from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave offering; seven
sabbaths shall be complete:
“Even unto the morrow after the seventh sabbath shall ye number
fifty days; and ye shall offer a new meat offering unto the LORD”
(Leviticus 23:15, 16).
There was the institution of the Feast of Weeks: seven weeks from the
Passover, and a day added, making it fifty days that were to be set aside unto
the Lord. These seven sabbaths, in addition to the sabbath of the Passover, were
the weekly sabbaths. Paul tells in I Corinthians 15:20-23 that the offering of the
firstfruits was Christ, and afterwards they that are Christ’s at His coming. Thus
this offering typified His resurrection which occurred on the morrow after the
sabbath. Christ perfectly fulfilled the offering of the firstfruits in His resurrection
“on the morrow after the sabbath.”
The significance of this seven weeks is told in Acts 2:1-4, “when the day of
Pentecost was fully come” — fifty days from the crucifixion to Pentecost. There
was the fulfillment. In Acts 2:15, Peter tells us it was the third hour of the day —
nine o’clock in the morning — when the Holy Ghost came upon them. It was at
the third hour of the day that Jesus was crucified. How perfectly Jesus fulfilled
the Passover!
It has been computed that Jesus arrived in Jerusalem on the tenth day of
the month, and on the fourteenth day He was offered up a sacrifice, perfectly
fulfilling the type. The third hour in the morning He was nailed to the cross. That
was at the time of the morning sacrifice; and the ninth hour was the time of the
evening sacrifice. It was then He cried, “It is finished.” Thus He perfectly fulfilled
the type of the Paschal Lamb.
Just fifty days afterward at the exact hour — nine o’clock in the morning —
we have the power falling and the fulfillment of the Feast of Weeks in the
outpouring of God’s Spirit. It was on the day, the last day of the Feast of Weeks,
that the Law was given on Mount Sinai. It was the giving of the Law that
established the Children of Israel as God’s people. It was the giving of the Holy
Ghost that established Christians as the Church of Christ.

The Feast of Tabernacles

The last feast is the Feast of Tabernacles, Leviticus 23. On the fifteenth
day of the tenth month (seven months from the Passover) they were to dwell in
booths in the land. This was in commemoration of their living in tents while in the
wilderness. Here they were in Canaan according to God’s promise. They were
enjoying the fruits of the land, and the seventh month was the time of the
ingathering of the harvest. It was to remind them of the travails which they had
gone through in the wilderness, that they might return thanks unto the Lord for
deliverance from them. It was a time of thanksgiving and rejoicing similar to our

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Thanksgiving Day. This feast has not yet been historically fulfilled. In Zechariah
14:16 we read of its fulfillment in the time of the Millennium:
“And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the
nations which came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year
to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, and to keep the feast of
tabernacles.
The prophet is speaking of the millennial period in this chapter. In
Revelation 14:14, 15, we read:
“And I looked, and behold a white cloud, and upon the cloud one sat
like unto the Son of man, having on his head a golden crown, and in his
hand a sharp sickle.
“And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice
to him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in thy sickle, and reap: for the time is
come for thee to reap; for the harvest of the earth is ripe.”
And He thrust in His sickle and reaped. That is the reaping of the harvest
just prior to the ingathering. Joel tells us of the Latter Rain falling. We are living in
the time of the Latter Rain. It was for the ripening of the fruit just before the great
ingathering. We are upon the very threshold of the “great ingathering” when we
shall fulfill the final Feast of Tabernacles in the Millennium. Our goal is worth
striving for.

The Over-All Plan of Atonement

___Lesson Eighteen___

The Son of God

No name has lived through the ages like that of Jesus Christ. The words
that He spoke were few. We could read them all in a very short time, but they
make an imprint upon mankind such as no other words throughout the annals of
history ever made. That alone would mark Him as above man, vindicating His
claim that He was the Son of God. The enduring effect of His message does that.
No matter how man may deny the claim He made for Himself, there
remains that fact from which no one can escape: that He was the Son of God. He
stands out above all prophets who went before Him, above all who have
succeeded Him.
His message did not stop with what He Himself taught and spoke. It was
carried on through His disciples. The words of His disciples bear the same weight
as those Jesus Himself spoke. They come with the authority of the Spirit, so
much so that they are counted the Lord’s Words as much as though He Himself
had spoken them.

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 In His intercessory prayer Jesus said, “Neither pray I for these alone, but
for them also which shall believe on me through their word” (John 17: 20). He
expected men to give credence to the testimony of His disciples and Apostles.
What then are we to accept as being the Word of the Lord? The whole Bible from
start to finish. When Jesus is speaking about His Word He has reference to the
entire inspired Word. It stands as a whole.
Following His office of Prophet, He next filled that of Priest, about which
we have been studying. There are five chapters devoted to that in the Epistle to
the Hebrews. That is remarkable because that office is only incidentally referred
to in other parts of the New Testament. This is an outstanding Epistle in that
respect. The Levitical priesthood had extended up to this time.
The writer of Hebrews starts the subject of Christ’s Priesthood in
Hebrews 6:20.
“Whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made an high
priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec.”
That is a quotation from the 110th Psalm. (The incident itself was in
Genesis, but the matter of His being made a priest after the order of Mel-
chisedec is recorded in Psalm 110.) Then he begins to draw the parallel between
Melchisedec and Jesus. Without beginning and end is one parallel. We have no
record of his having a father or mother, or of his end. He comes into the pages of
history and disappears, and that is all we know about him. He was King of
Salem, and that is supposed to have been what is now Jerusalem. The
Priesthood of Jesus Christ was without beginning and without end.
What else does he draw from this type of Melchisedec? His priesthood
was heavenly, not earthly. It was greater than Aaron’s. In what respect was
Melchisedec’s greater? Abraham paid tithes to Melchisedec; and as the writer
brings out, the lesser paid tithes to the greater. Therefore Abraham recognized
Him as being greater than himself. The Levitical priesthood descended from
Abraham. He offered Himself while the Levitical priesthood offered beasts. Jesus’
Priesthood was not by a carnal commandment, that is by commandment of men.
The Levitical priesthood was continued by succession. That was
necessary because they were subject to death. But the Priesthood of Christ was
unending, never changing. His was after the power of an endless life. He
subjected Himself to death, but death could not hold Him. He was not subject to
death as mortal man is; therefore He had in this respect a priesthood that was far
above the Levitical priesthood.
The work of the priesthood was to represent men before God; to in-
tercede as a mediator between God and man. Jesus entered upon His medi-
atonal work when He took up His office of Priest. Another way Jesus’ Priesthood
differed from the Levitical priesthood was that He offered His Blood once for all.
The priests offered the blood of animals for their own sins, but Christ did not do
that. His Priesthood was also confirmed with an oath, just as the New Covenant
was confirmed with an oath. God swore by Himself because there was none

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greater; He Himself is eternal. That establishes the eternal nature of Jesus’
Priesthood. Therefore the Priesthood of Jesus Christ came in and set aside the
old order of the Levitical priesthood.

The Day of Atonement

The outstanding offering of the Old Testament period was the sin offering
on the Day of Atonement. The high priest alone made that offering. That was the
tenth day of the seventh month. This offering or sacrifice led all others. It
symbolized the great Atonement. Just as Jesus Christ’s sacrifice stands out as
the great Atonement for mankind, so this sin offering symbolized that Atonement.
The priest offered the bullock first for his own sins and for the sins of the
priests. Then he offered a goat for the sins of the people. The blood in each
occasion was taken in and put on the horns of the golden altar and then taken in
and put on the Mercy Seat in the Holiest of All. The bodies of those beasts were
burned without the camp.
The trespass offering was for the sins of individuals. The sinner had to
bring this offering personally and present it to the priest for any wrong that he had
done.
We cannot escape the fact of the necessity of a personal application of the
Blood because of the general fact of the Atonement. It is written in the Old
Testament in the offerings they gave. That is where some churches have missed
the mark. Certain denominations look upon the Atonement of Jesus Christ as an
offering for sin in general, and all that is necessary is to give an assent to that.
There is more to it than that; there must be a personal application of the Blood to
every individual just the same as each man in Israel was required to bring his
trespass offering.
The trespass offering was brought to the priest, and he laid his hands on
the head of the beast and then it was slain and the offering was made. So we
have those two: the general offering for atonement, and the trespass offering for
the individual.
The burnt offering was also for the individual. What did this signify?
Consecration. He who had first brought his trespass offering and had it accepted
of the Lord was then eligible to bring this burnt offering. It was laid upon the altar
and was consumed by fire, typifying a complete yielding of self. The burnt
offering was consumed upon the brazen altar and the sin offering was burnt
outside the camp.
“I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye
present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is
your reasonable service” (Romans 12:1).

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Types of Sanctification
There you have the spiritual significance of the burnt offering. The
presentation of that offering through the consecration of his life is man’s part.
When the fire falls from Heaven and consumes that sacrifice, that is God’s part.
When we come to the altar seeking sanctification, we present our lives a living
sacrifice, consecrate our all to the Lord; and a deeper consecration is required
than was required to get salvation.
When a man has received salvation he is on a plane where he can
consecrate deeper than he could as a sinner. He has the Spirit of the Lord within
him. Before that, the Spirit of the Lord simply convicts him of his sin. As far as he
could, he had to make an unconditional consecration then. He surrendered his
life. But now he consecrates to a deeper depth. All you who have sought your
sanctification know you had to consecrate a great deal deeper for your
sanctification than you ever did before you received your salvation. It took a
going down before the Lord such as your salvation never required.
A man never gets salvation unless he makes a complete surrender as far
as he has the light; but after having the Spirit of the living God, he has more light;
and then he consecrates accordingly. When he has his all upon the altar the fire
of Heaven falls and consumes it.
That gives him access into the Holy Place. It is well-named because one
enters into the realm of holiness. It symbolizes the spiritual plane upon which he
lives thereafter. Just as the priests, after they had made the burnt offering,
entered into the Holy Place representing the people, so, spiritually, the man who
has presented his burnt offering and had it received and the fire has fallen on it
and consumed it, goes into the Holy Place and there is where he dwells. Here
are the golden candlesticks, the enlightening of the Spirit. The shewbread
signifies the Word of God, and the incense upon the golden altar signifies the
ascending prayers of the saints. There it is all perfectly typified.
When the Israelites came with their trespass offering, they expected God
to forgive them. If they presented that trespass offering in faith they were forgiven
and had a knowledge of salvation, as we shall see when we enter into the
eleventh chapter. They knew not only what salvation was, but also what
sanctification was.
Did the fire of each burnt offering descend from Heaven? No, after the
initial kindling of it the fire was kept burning upon the altar supplied by wood. That
was the commandment: it was never to go out night or day.
How did they know their sacrifice was accepted by the Lord? By faith —
spiritually. They never would have brought the sacrifice if they did not have faith
that God was going to consume it. We go to the altar in faith today. If they came
without faith they went through the ceremony but that was all there was to it.
When we go to the altar today we must come in the right spirit, or we get nothing
from the Lord. They received their experiences through faith the same as we do
today. That is the very thing we find Paul bringing out in the 11th chapter.

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 Where did the scapegoat come in? On the Day of Atonement two goats
were brought; one was slain and the blood taken into the Holy Place. The priest
then laid his hands on the head of the other, confessing the sins of the people,
and with that the scapegoat was driven into the wilderness. A certain Israelite
was appointed to lead it out into the wilderness and there it roamed in an
uninhabited land. It was typical of Christ’s bearing our sins, as is set forth in
Isaiah:
“All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his
own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all”
(Isaiah 53:6).
Thus every phase of Christ’s atonement was symbolized on the Day of
Atonement.
The bullock of the sin offering on the Day of Atonement, the blood of
which was taken into the Holiest of All and sprinkled on the Mercy Seat, was
burned completely outside the camp. “Wherefore Jesus also, that he might
sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered without the gate” (Hebrews
13:12). There we have the sin offering pointing immediately to the work of
sanctification.
No sooner is a man justified than, if he follows the leading of the Spirit, he
will go on into sanctification, because one naturally follows the other. They are
separate works. No matter if one receives them ten years, ten days, or ten
seconds apart, they are separate works.
In Hebrews 9, it speaks about the Tabernacle.
“Now when these things were thus ordained, the priests went always
into the first tabernacle, accomplishing the service of God.
“But into the second went the high priest alone once every year, not
without blood, which he offered for himself, and for the errors of the
people:
“The Holy Ghost this signifying, that the way into the holiest of all
was not yet made manifest, while as the first tabernacle was yet standing”
(Hebrews 9:6-8).

Types of the Baptism of the Holy Ghost

The priests by their courses went into the Holy Place daily, but into this
Holiest of All went the high priest only, and that only once a year. No one but the
high priest went in there, and he only on the Day of Atonement. Now he brings
out the significance that the Holiest was not yet made manifest while that the
Tabernacle was yet standing. When was it made manifest? When Christ died. It
was signified by the rending of the veil of the Temple. That veil of the Temple
signified Christ’s body, His flesh.

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 This indicated an entrance into the Holiest of All which up to that time had
remained a mystery. That is a type of the baptism of the Holy Ghost, an
experience that distinguishes the New Dispensation from the former: the opening
into the Holiest of All where God’s glory dwelt.
One receives a measure of the Holy Spirit when he is saved. The Spirit of
God takes possession of a man when he is saved. He experiences a deeper
incoming of the Spirit when he is sanctified; but the baptism of the Holy Ghost is
an experience that overtowers them all. One has the Spirit in both his salvation
and sanctification, but not in His fullness. It is only in that third experience that
the Holy Ghost comes in in His official capacity.
That is what marks our present dispensation. It was one of the mysteries
which the prophets inquired about and the angels desired to look into. We have
in this dispensation what they never had in the Old Dispensation. It is not to be
confused with sanctification as certain holiness people do, and it is not to be
received until one has been wholly sanctified, as is taught not only in the New
Testament but definitely set forth in the sacrifices in the Old Testament.
Do you see where we get our good solid ground for the position we have
taken in three different experiences, not only in the New but also in the Old
written in the Levitical Law? Therefore, we say that in the brazen altar was
typified justification; in the Holy Place was typified the sanctified life by the golden
altar of incense which was kept burning continually; and then in the Holiest of All
was typified the baptism of the Holy Ghost as clearly as God’s Word could
possibly set it forth.

Additional Offerings
In addition to the sin offering, the trespass offering, and the burnt offering,
were the thank offerings, peace offerings, and others. Just as today we bring our
tithes and freewill offerings unto the Lord, so they brought their various offerings.
These were in acknowledgment of God’s providential care over them. All the way
through they were constantly reminded of their complete dependence upon the
Lord.
The burnt offerings typified consecration, especially as concerning
sanctification, although sanctification was also typified in the sin offering by the
bodies that were burned without the camp. While one was a general symbol of it,
the other was an individual symbol.
We found that after the Law was given and had been dedicated with the
sprinkling of blood, and Israel had entered into a covenant with the Lord, He
immediately gave them instructions for the building of the Tabernacle, and the
laws for establishing the Tabernacle service as a means whereby they could
worship God, for executing or carrying out the fulfillment of the Law.
In the New Testament we find the fulfillment of the Law in Christ. Christ is
the perfect fulfillment of the entire Tabernacle service, from beginning to end.

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 There were also the morning and evening sacrifices symbolizing worship.
And they, being burnt offerings, signified a daily consecration of their lives to the
Lord. We have the same thing spiritually now in our services in the
reconsecrating and rededicating of our lives. We often say it is not sufficient to
have made our consecrations a year, a month, or a week ago; they have to be
kept up. It was symbolized in the Old Testament worship where they had their
morning and evening sacrifices continually.
Everywhere the burnt offering comes in, one thing is always typified: and
that is consecration, the yielding of the life and all to God. The people would
come and worship at that hour. We read in Acts that Peter and John went up to
the Gate Beautiful at the hour of prayer. That was at the time of the morning
sacrifice, the third hour. The evening sacrifice was three o’clock in the afternoon
or the ninth hour.
In the Hebrew reckoning there were two evenings to every day. Any time
after twelve o’clock noon until sundown was known as the first evening and from
sundown on to darkness was known as the second evening. Therefore, when it
speaks of evening it does not necessarily mean the period of dusk; it can be any
time in the afternoon.

The Holy Ghost in the Church

The Holy Ghost is in the world today in His official capacity. I believe when
Paul said, in II Thessalonians 2:7, “. . . only he who now letteth will let, until he be
taken out of the way,” he had reference to the Holy Spirit, or the Holy Ghost, who
now is in the Church; and when the Holy Ghost is taken out of the world, the
Church will be gone, too. The dispensation of the Holy Ghost began on the Day
of Pentecost; and according to Paul’s writings it is very evident that the
dispensation of the Holy Ghost ends when the Church is taken out. Christ’s
Church was established with the coming of the Holy Ghost. When the Church is
taken out, the work of the Holy Ghost is finished. After that we are not told very
much about the Holy Ghost, but that He still retains His place as the Third Person
of the Trinity is beyond question.
We have in the baptismal formula the three Persons of the Holy Trinity
named: “the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost”
(Matthew 28:19).
The first promise of Jesus is given in Genesis 3:15: “And I will put enmity
between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise
thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” That was the promise of Jesus, the
promise of Him that was to come in the flesh, His first coming — a Messianic
promise.
But God gave a more comprehensive promise to Abraham, that in him
should all the nations of the earth be blessed. That promise was more or less of
a mystery to the Israelites. But to the extent that they exercised faith in God they
received their experiences. They did not have the light that we have today. They

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were looking forward to it just as Abraham rejoiced to see Jesus’ day. He
rejoiced in that promise that God had given him, but he looked far down through
the centuries and failed to comprehend it fully. To him there was rejoicing in the
Spirit, because he saw afar the fulfillment of the promise. In fact, the name
“Isaac” means laughter, because through Isaac’s seed was God’s promise to be
fulfilled.
When those old patriarchs are spoken of as perfect in their generation,
they were perfect to the extent of the light they had. Theirs was not the perfection
to which we may attain. A perfect heart is one whose intention is at all times to do
that which pleases God, to never take a step or make a move that we know
would displease Him. It is possible for a person, even with a perfect heart, to fall
into error: through misjudgment or limited mental capacity, or spiritual incapacity
or infirmities of the body. But that is a very different thing from doing knowingly
that which displeases God. That brings condemnation. We may do things that we
find afterward displease God; and yet we did them with the honest intention of
trying to please Him. To have a sincere purpose to please God in all that we do is
a standard of perfection to which we can all attain.

Roll Call of the Heroes of Faith

___Lesson Nineteen___

The 11th chapter of Hebrews is the climax of the Epistle to the Hebrews.
Here Paul reaches the consummation of all he has to say. He has been bringing
out the relationship between the Old and the New Dispensations through
unfolding their meaning step by step.
Then having done this, and having shown how the Old Dispensation has
fulfilled its mission, he shows that in that dispensation there were certain worthies
who attained to what God had designed they should attain under that provision.

Faith vs. Unbelief

He showed that those who failed, died without hope; and there were
multitudes who failed under the Old Dispensation. They failed because of their
unbelief. This did not mean atheistic unbelief — that they denied the existence of
God, or even denied His plan of redemption — but it meant such unbelief that
failed to realize the redemption God had for them. They failed to experience the
things that God had provided in His plan.
Having shown that they failed through unbelief, he goes on to bring out the
all-essential virtue, faith, that those possessed who made the goal. Under the
Law faith was just as essential, just as necessary, as under Grace.

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They were under the Law, but even in that time all that they received, all that was
accomplished, was just as it is today — by faith. The rule, “The just shall live by
faith,” was from the beginning.
The men mentioned in this chapter seem to have had more faith than
some of us today. They certainly shine out like beacon lights. I wonder at the
standards they had in that remote period where they had to live by shadows
rather than by the substance. Of course they had the substance when they
received their experiences. Although they did not have what you and I have
today to uphold us, to encourage and keep us, they certainly put to shame some
of the Christians of the present day. He brings forth a whole chapter of witnesses
here vindicating the possibility of attaining God’s best even in that remote period.
And if these men could do it, everyone in Israel could have done it. Much more
can we do it today.

Faith Defined
He starts the chapter with a formal definition of faith. This is about the only
definition in the Word of God. We generally have to formulate our definitions by
collating different verses and then deducing our conclusions from what we have
collected. If, for example, we will go through Scripture and gather together all the
verses bearing upon the subject of justification, we can from that formulate our
definition of justification.
Webster also gives us a definition of faith, but there is a great difference
between Paul’s definition and Webster’s. Webster’s is from the intellectual
standpoint, but Paul’s is from the spiritual standpoint. And there is as much
difference between intellectual faith and Biblical faith as there is between daylight
and darkness. Therefore, when we talk about faith we are talking about
something more than just an operation of the mind.
“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of
things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1).
Faith is something that deals with those things that are beyond the five
senses. “Things that are hoped for,” that is, that are based upon promises; and
“things that are not seen,” beyond the realm of the natural. The word “substance”
means a foundation or basis. So here at the start is the necessary foundation of
all that we receive from God. That word “evidence” might be translated
“demonstration.” It is a mathematical term. It is the term that the Greek
mathematicians used in demonstrating their problems. It means a demonstration
that is convincing beyond any question. For instance: you take the problem of
Pythagoras, that the sum of the squares of the two sides of a right triangle is
equal to the square of the hypotenuse. When the demonstration is completed it
cannot be gainsaid. No one can question it or in any wise disprove it. If you have
studied geometry and have gone through the demonstration of that particular
problem, you know there is no one that can deny it any more than you can deny

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that two and two make four. It stands. That is what is meant by this word
“evidence.” It is a mathematical demonstration of the things that are not seen.

The Sixth Sense

Faith is something that is very much like a sixth sense; and man cannot
deny the evidences of his senses. You say, “Seeing is believing.” That is one of
the evidences that is taken in through the eye. It is the same with touch. I know
that that desk is there because I can feel it. That is another sense. The same with
hearing. But here we have a sense that deals with things that are out of the
range of the eye, the ear, or the hand — the things that are not seen.
Through this faculty of faith with which the Lord endows us we are given a
knowledge of those things not seen. A man must have a little faith in order to get
saved; he has to have it even to approach God. But the moment that man prays
through and receives justification his faith takes a leap; in a moment of time a
faith that he never had before comes in. One thing he knows is that he can go
out and face the world and not be a victim of the sins that once had him bound;
he is sure of it. There is a demonstration placed in that man’s soul that faith and
faith alone brings. That is one of the things that he hoped for.
No man ever yet sought God for salvation but that he hoped for a
deliverance from sin; if he did not hope for a deliverance from sin he was never
saved. More than that: he wants a deliverance from all sin, and upon no other
basis will he be saved. That very hope is realized by the faculty that God gives
him, which we call faith.
We are certainly living in times when we need to take the words of that
song to heart: “Take Time to Be Holy.” We need to retire into the holy place
where we can be alone with the Lord, because the world is in turmoil; and it is
easy when we are in the midst of that turmoil to become involved in it, more or
less, ourselves. We thank God we have a place where we can retire and be
alone with the Lord and keep in touch with high Heaven in these trying days.
If you analyze present conditions you will find that unbelief is at the bottom
of the trouble today — unbelief concerning God and His Word! And it is
becoming more apparent as we draw near the end. Were men to have faith in
God the question of sin would be solved.
Some years ago you would find a faith in God among even the average
run of men who were sinners. They still believed in many of the fundamental
doctrines of the Bible; they never questioned the fact that God ruled over all.
Although the majority of them did not yield their lives to Him or serve Him yet
they held to that faith; but it is waning. For many years there have been attacks
on the fundamental teachings of the Bible. There is a prevalent idea today that
this entire Bible is simply the product of Hebrew thought; that the doctrines which
are set forth here are the ideas which grew up in the Hebrew mind; that they
were the ideas of men concerning God, and that they have no fundamental

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basis. Such ideas are at the bottom of modernism today. The result is that it has
permeated humanity until faith has waned.
Paul, after showing how the Jews had utterly failed because of their
unbelief, starts out upon this famous 11th chapter showing that the basic
principle of godliness must be faith — faith in the heart. Faith is that grace in the
soul that enables a man to see the unseen. That is what Paul had in mind when
he said:
“While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things
which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the
things which are not seen are eternal” (II Corinthians 4:18).
Nothing but faith can enable a man to see the unseen; it brings the
unseen into view and it makes the unknown known. Faith does more than just
enable us to believe; it makes us know. That is why Paul calls it a demonstration
of things not seen. It brings it so clearly before the eye and lays it so definitely in
the soul that all questions are dissolved. That is where the assurance of the
Christian comes in; by faith he has a bedrock foundation. That is what Isaiah had
reference to when he spoke of a sure foundation. That foundation is Christ; and
when we are founded upon Him, an assurance comes into the heart, an
assurance that nothing can dispel. And from that basic faith within the soul flow
all the virtues of the Christian life.

Victory Through Faith

That is what enabled the patriarchs, the men of God, and the martyrs of
old to endure through thick and thin, to face a frowning world and scoffing
humanity and persecutors who hunted them like rats, and still hold to their belief
— they had assurance in their heart. They took their orientation from things that
were not seen.
Paul proceeds with a catalog of men and women living back in the Old
Testament age about which we have been studying, and shows how every one
of them prevailed, ran their race, finished their course, and won the victory
through faith. He starts at the beginning, but Adam is not mentioned — he was
expelled from the Garden. He had his golden opportunity, but he let it slip for less
than a mess of pottage; therefore he is not chronicled with the great men. These
men, compassed about by infirmities, with lesser advantages than Adam
enjoyed, prevailed where Adam failed. Adam had a chance to see within his own
household what sin could do, what disobedience in the Garden could bring in the
way of a harvest; and it started with his own sons. We will begin with Abel.
“By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain,
by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his
gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh” (Hebrews 11:4).
We might turn back to the account of Abel in Genesis 4:3-15. These men
brought offerings at that early date. That in itself would signify that they felt the

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necessity of a reconciliation to God. Whatever their perceptions of truth were
they certainly felt a separation from God; and there had to be something done to
unite them with God. That characteristic has been found among all races
irrespective of their religious beliefs. Even the heathen make offerings unto their
gods. It is an acknowledgment of their sins. The convicting Spirit of the Lord is
upon them.
Cain brought the fruits of the field, while Abel brought of the firstlings of his
flock. These men either perceived in their conscience or through the training that
they had had in their home, perhaps from Adam and Eve, this necessity. But it is
very apparent that in the difference of their offerings one was able to approach
the Lord and the other was not.
Abel, in coming with the firstlings of his flock, offered a blood sacrifice and
he was accepted of the Lord. He conformed to what the promptings of the Spirit
had revealed, or what had been taught him: that in order to come to God there
must be a shedding of blood.
We may confess our failings and our faults, but without the shedding of
Blood there is no remission. That seems to have been revealed to men at this
early date. God deals faithfully with souls in whatever age they may live, or
whatever their culture or lack of it may be.
The truth had come to the heart of Abel. Possibly it had come to Cain,
also, but Cain showed a very different disposition. It comes home to the hearts of
men today. Many men who are refusing to yield to God know perfectly that they
have fallen far short of God’s standard. God is just as faithful to their souls as He
has been to ours. God deals with all men; it does not make any difference how
steeped in sin a man may be, or how hardened he has been against anything
spiritual—somewhere along the line God has dealt with that man. Somewhere
along the line the Spirit of the living God has dealt with the most reprobate hearts
that are to be found in the world today. God is no respecter of persons.
We can look back in our own career when we had little light, when very
little of the Word of God had been revealed to us; yet we know that in that state
God dealt with our hearts, showed us what was right and what was wrong and
what we ought to do, so that we were not altogether in darkness.
I believe that Cain knew just as well what was necessary in order to
conform to God’s requirements as Abel did, but he refused to do it. God said to
him: “If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well,
sin lieth at the door” (Genesis 4:7). Cain shows the very spirit that is manifested
today — knees that will not bend, a will that will not yield, a disposition that is set
against God.
Abel offered a lamb, laid it upon the altar, and it was accepted of the Lord
— possibly by fire falling from Heaven — while Cain’s was rejected. Then Cain
was wroth. He rose up against his brother, even after the Lord had warned him,
and slew him.

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The Atonement Ignored
Here we find two types of religion. They have continued down to the
present time. Cain’s religion was that which depended upon his own works. He
expected to find acceptance by bringing the fruits of his labor. That is what has
characterized many religions through the ages. It is what lies back of modernism
today: it is not necessary, they say, to have a sacrifice. The Blood Atonement is
the chief object of attack by modernists today. They are willing to accept Jesus
as a teacher; they are willing to receive Him as a great master; they are willing to
point to Him as a great example; but when it comes to His laying down His life a
sacrifice for sin, they halt there.
I once heard over the radio a sermon by a leading preacher of New York,
and the subject was the necessity of cleansing. He spoke for some forty-five
minutes, and through that entire period there was not one mention of the Blood
nor the necessity of a sacrifice. He went on to say how men, amidst the duties of
life and out in the world, coming in contact with the unclean, stood in need of
cleansing; and it was necessary for them to have that cleansing in order to meet
God’s requirements. But he said not one word concerning the means that God
had provided for that cleansing.
If a man is defiled with sin and he has nothing within himself to cope with
sin, if his own experience vindicates constantly that he in himself cannot possibly
prevail over it, then he has to have something outside himself to master that
problem. He cannot look to his fellow men for it, because they are in the same
situation as he; therefore, there is only one source to look to and that is God.
There must be a cleansing before God can do anything more for us. That is set
forth not only in the Word, but in the conscience of men. Then we must accept
God’s cleansing before there is any possibility at all of release from sin. Christian
Science, Spiritualism, Unity, New Thought, New Theology — these are all current
names that have been ascribed to certain beliefs, and every one of them, and
others, too, deny the Atonement or the necessity for it.
Religious persecutions started with Cain and have continued to the
present. The greatest persecutions that Christianity has endured have not come
from pagans, as much as from those who professed religion. Jesus was opposed
by the religious professors of His day. It was not the sinner upon the street corner
who was opposing Him; it was the scribes and the Pharisees.
Cain and Abel, in approaching the Lord with offerings, indicated that the
sin inherited from their parents had already begun to work in their members. The
consciousness of guilt and condemnation caused them to seek an atonement.
This was their motive in coming before the Lord with offerings. Abel, following the
promptings of the Spirit, conformed to the provisions of the Law which were not
yet given. We have no indication that any of the Word had been committed to
writing before Moses’ time. Abel brought an offering of blood, a slain lamb,
without which there was no remission of sins. Thus he sought justification by
faith.

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 Cain, on the other hand, following the promptings of a carnal mind,
brought the fruits of the ground, the product of his labors, and thus he sought
justification by works. That is why Cain’s offering was rejected. Thus at this early
date we find revealed the two kinds of religion: the true religion of divine origin
which demands a Blood atonement for sin, and grants justification by faith; and
the false religion of human origin, the bloodless kind which seeks justification by
works. These two have continued to the present day.

Enoch, an Example of Faith

“By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and
was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation
he had this testimony, that he pleased God.
“But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh
to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that
diligently seek him” (Hebrews 11:5, 6).
Not much is recorded in the Bible about Enoch. There are only three
passages in Scripture referring to him: this passage in Hebrews, and a second in
Genesis 5:22-24.
“And Enoch walked with God after he begat Methuselah three
hundred years, and begat sons and daughters:
“And all the days of Enoch were three hundred sixty and five years:
“And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him.”
Then we have a third passage in Jude 14:
“And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these,
saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints.”
Thus we have a very meager biography of Enoch, but what is given
speaks volumes. There is much to be drawn out of what little is said concerning
Enoch. It speaks here of his having a son Methuselah; and Methuselah’s
biography is about as short as Enoch’s or shorter.
“Methuselah lived after he begat Lamech seven hundred eighty and
two years, and begat sons and daughters:
“And all the days of Methuselah were nine hundred sixty and nine
years: and he died” (Genesis 5:26, 27).
That is about all it says about Methuselah. Enoch was very different; he
lived less than half the time of his son, but much can be said about him. In the
first place, it says that he walked with God. We, therefore, know that he was a
man of holiness and righteousness. He was one who, like Abel, had conformed
to God’s requirements and brought the sacrifices that were pleasing unto the
Lord, and obtained this holiness through thus conforming.

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 Adam walked with God before he fell, and he was created in true holiness
and righteousness. No man can walk with the Lord without these graces. It
means an upright life and a holy walk to have God’s fellowship; and upon no
other condition will anyone have fellowship with God. That verb “walked” has a
depth of meaning. It is in a certain Hebrew conjugation which means this: Enoch
set himself to walk with God. That expresses determination. He did not walk with
God as a mere matter of pleasure, because it was not easy for him; but he set
himself to the task, and determined to do it.
Just mark the virtues of this man: holiness, righteousness, determination.
He walked with God three hundred years. There is no account that he backslid
during that period. There we have endurance. Then it says that he pleased God.
That meant, for one thing, obedience. Faith was at the bottom of it, and if he had
faith he believed. Belief and faith are synonymous terms in the Bible. And if a
man believes as the Bible sets forth he is going to obey God.
There is no use for a man to talk about his faith in God and then disobey
Him. The devils believe and tremble. If a man has Scriptural belief he obeys God
and walks in His commandments and precepts.
This all means that Enoch had a perfect heart, a heart which was set upon
pleasing God in everything that he did. By faith Enoch walked with God. God no
doubt was invisible, as He was to Moses; but Moses endured as seeing Him who
is invisible. No doubt Enoch walked the same way— that is, he walked by faith
the same as you and I do.
If we see God in this life, we see Him by the eye of faith, not with these
natural eyes. That is, no doubt, what caused Enoch to endure. It is what caused
Moses to endure.

Translation Faith
By this same faith Enoch was also translated. That means an in-
stantaneous change — in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye. A change is
wrought at death; but Enoch experienced this change without passing through
the grave. He continued walking with God in communion and fellowship with Him
until the time arrived when he just stepped off the earth and vanished, and his
friends saw him no more. We would not know, perhaps, except as it was
revealed by the Spirit to Paul, what had happened to Enoch; but the inspired
Word tells us that he was translated. That was in the antediluvian period.
Enoch lived when there was perhaps not one line of God’s Word in writing,
living a life so close to the Lord, measuring up to the standards that God
required, so that he attained to that goal which is the call of the Church of Christ:
to be ready in that day when the Lord appears.
In Enoch we have a type of the translation of the Church. We have
another type later on in the case of Elijah, in the time of the prophets. We might

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review a few of the passages of Scripture on this subject. The most plain account
is found in I Thessalonians 4:13, 14:
“But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them
which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope.
“For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also
which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him.”
And if we believe the one, it will not be difficult to believe the other. If we
accept the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ as an historical fact (and it is
well authenticated) then why question any miracle in Scriptures? Here is the
miracle of miracles; here hinge all the questions concerning God’s miraculous
power. And because Jesus died and rose again, it makes the religion that He
brought to earth essentially a supernatural religion from start to finish. And if we
believe this, it settles the entire question of miracles from one end of the Bible to
the other: the miracle of the bringing forth of Lazarus from the grave; of Jonah
spending three days and three nights in the belly of the whale; of the many who
were restored to life; of the three Hebrew children in the fiery furnace; of Daniel in
the lions’ den; and scores of other miracles which have been recorded in God’s
Word.
If we deny the miracle of the Resurrection, we might as well discard the
Bible, because there is the cornerstone of your faith and mine. “And if Christ be
not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins” (I Corinthians 15:17). If
Christ then died and rose again there is nothing the least bit fantastic about the
raising of all the rest of the dead, or of the translation of those who remain unto
the last day; it is settled once and for all. The death and resurrection of Jesus
Christ put a seal upon all the rest of His ministry. It gives final authority to every
statement He made. He claimed to be God’s Son, and He vindicated His claim in
rising from the dead. We have something sure in our religion, something
unshakable. Paul spends an entire chapter upon that question of the resurrection
of Jesus Christ, because upon that is founded all our faith.
He mentions that five hundred brethren saw Jesus after His resurrection,
the most of whom were alive at the time that Paul wrote. Any of them could have
contradicted him if they had chosen. Therefore the Resurrection stands as a well-
founded fact of history.
“For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are
alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which
are asleep.
“For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with
the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in
Christ shall rise first” (I Thessalonians 4:15, 16).
Is not that literal enough? Is there any room for spiritualizing such a
description? That is a detailed description of what is going to happen. Paul bases
the fact upon the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Himself.
“Then we which are alive . . .

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 He says “we” because he himself had the hope in his day of living unto the
coming of the Lord. And it has been the hope of every true Christian from Paul’s
time on down. He had a right to believe it. Paul, you say, had that hope, but he
did not realize it. No, but that very hope in his breast will enable him to be among
those sleeping saints when the Lord does come. That is the lively hope that
keeps you and me right up, toeing the mark, living the thing. Subtract that literal
hope of the Lord’s coming from the faith of the church and you have a dead
church.
I never heard a sermon on the Coming of the Lord until I came among the
Apostolic Faith people. It was a dead subject, never referred to. Where I
attended, they held the postmillennial view, that the Millennium would be ushered
in through the mission of the church, through her evangelizing the nations; thus,
spiritually and gradually, would the Millennium be ushered in upon this world. If
that was the mission of the church then she has woefully failed of it. After the end
of a thousand years, according to this doctrine, would come the grand
consummation — the coming of the Lord and the catching away of the Church. I
lived in a dead church — that hope lay at least a thousand years ahead, and
therefore it was no hope at all.
But in Thessalonians is a lively hope because it is our expectation that it
can happen at any time; and that is the teaching of God’s Word. There is nothing
that needs to be fulfilled between now and the time when the Lord shall appear to
catch away His Church. That is just how essential it is that you and I be
momentarily ready, that we have an experience that is up to date, up to the
minute at all times. We know not when the Lord is coming. We are living in the
period when the signs are multiplying on every hand.
“Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together
with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be
with the Lord” (I Thessalonians 4:17).
That is the great translation when these bodies are changed in a moment,
in the twinkling of an eye; these vile bodies changed into the likeness of His
glorious body.
“Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, . . .
(I Corinthians 15:51).
That is what these Biblical writers considered death. For one who knew
the Lord, it was just dropping off to sleep for a period.
“. . . but we shall all be changed,
“In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the
trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we
shall be changed.
“For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must
put on immortality.

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 “So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this
mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the
saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory”
(I Corinthians 15:51-54).
This is our inheritance. In this life we have only a foretaste of it. Every one
of us will acknowledge that words can never tell what even our present
experiences mean to us. We have never been able to give an adequate
testimony of what the Lord has wrought. In order for man to know it he must
experience it. But here is something beyond these foretastes, where the
salvation of the Lord Jesus Christ shall reach its culmination. These are the
blessings that are awaiting the Church of Christ. The Lord expects us to keep
them ever in view.
“In that day, he which shall be upon the housetop, and his stuff in
the house, let him not come down to take it away: and he that is in the field,
let him likewise not return back” (Luke 17:31).
The next verse, I believe, is the second shortest verse in the Bible.
“Remember Lot’s wife.”
That speaks volumes.
“Whosoever shall seek to save his life shall lose it; and whosoever
shall lose his life shall preserve it.
“I tell you, in that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one
shall be taken, and the other shall be left.
“Two women shall be grinding together; the one shall be taken, and
the other left.
“Two men shall be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other
left.
“And they answered and said unto him, Where, Lord? And he said
unto them, Wheresoever the body is, thither will the eagles be gathered
together” (Luke 17:31-37).
We will turn to Revelation 19:6-9;
“And I heard as it were the voice of a great multitude, and as the
voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying,
Alleluia: for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.
“Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honour to him: for the marriage
of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready.
“And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen,
clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints.
“And he saith unto me, Write, Blessed are they which are called unto
the marriage supper of the Lamb. And he saith unto me, These are the true
sayings of God.”

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 Is it not wonderful that way back in the antediluvian period God gave a
prophetic type of this great event which is the consummation of His work upon
earth and the great event to which all the prophets were looking; to which the
Church has looked, and for which it has hoped? This is the goal upon which you
and I are expected to set our hearts. We are seeking to be ready for that event
above everything else. It means that we shall not become involved in the pursuits
of this life; or not even so much taken up with the work of the Lord that it will
distract us from taking time to be holy. The main purpose of these teachings is
that we might lay hold of that translation faith, that it will enable us, like Enoch, to
stand in that day.

“By Faith”
___Lesson Twenty___
Turn to Hebrews 11:7:
“By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet,
moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which
he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is
by faith.”
That expression “by faith” is the one with which each Biblical character in
this chapter is introduced. It was by faith that they fought their battles, won their
victories, and finally gained their ground.
This was in the Dispensation of the Law with all the elaborate Tabernacle
service, and with much outward religious ceremony. But at the same time, those
who were in contact with God and who won their victories came through exactly
the same way that we do in this dispensation under Grace. There is no
difference; the just shall live by faith whether it be in the antediluvian period, the
patriarchal period, the Mosaic period, or the Dispensation of the Gospel.
Therefore, they became outstanding examples for us today.

Noah, a Perfect Example

Noah did not live in a very encouraging age. There is quite a detailed
description of the conditions on the earth during his time. It states that the
wickedness of man was great, and the earth was filled with violence. “All flesh
had corrupted his way upon the earth” (Genesis 6:12). It also states what led to
this condition: The sons of God married the daughters of men. I understand that
the “sons of God” means there just what it does in other parts of the Bible — “the
redeemed.” That is expressly used several times throughout the Old Testament
as well as in the New, and it simply means those who have a knowledge of God
and are leading godly lives.

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 “The daughters of men” means the unredeemed. Perhaps the redeemed
were of the line of Seth, while the unredeemed may have been of the line of
Cain. The two classes existed in those days just as they have from that time on
down to the present period. It is the world and the church, the saint and the
sinner.
What led to this condition? It was the mingling of saints with sinners; that
is where the trouble began. If you analyze the history of God’s people all the way
down you will find that that is where the trouble originated in whatever age they
may have lived. That was why God gave the Israelites the strict injunction that
when they came into the Promised Land they were to keep themselves separate
from the nations round about them. They were not to make covenants with them;
they were not to intermarry with them; and above all, they were to have nothing
to do with their idolatry.
After all, what is the very essence of idolatry? Does it not, in its final
analysis, consist of the love of the visible things of this world, in men’s getting
their affections set upon them and giving precedence to those things over God?
That is the beginning of it; and then it goes on from stage to stage until finally it
descends into the abominable rites that marked the pagan idolatry of that period.
That is why throughout God’s Word there is the constant warning and injunction
for His people to keep themselves separated from the world.
Conditions in the world had here reached this stage. The world was not
very old at this time but God was about ready to call a halt. People wonder
sometimes why God permits conditions to exist as they do on the earth; why He
does not call a halt to them. He will in His own time. God marks the conditions in
the world.
God saw all that existed in Noah’s time. Another thing He said was that
man also is flesh; that is, he was given over to the flesh. Living for the flesh and
the things of the flesh marked his life. But in the midst of such a condition was
this outstanding character, Noah. When we consider this remote period of man
and the little spiritual light that was shed in those days, we see in Noah one of
the most outstanding characters of Biblical history.
It is said of him that he was a “just” man. That means that he was
righteous, that he had undergone a genuine experience of salvation, and
perhaps sanctification. That was in the antediluvian period. He walked with God
the same as Enoch. He “set himself to walk with God.” We are told, too, that he
was perfect in his generation. There you have three things said of Noah that are
just the opposite of what it says of the world: he was righteous, he walked with
God, and he was perfect in his generation.
In spite of all that men say about the inability and the lack of power to live
a godly life amidst the ungodly conditions in this world, we can go back centuries
to the antediluvian period — that age when you might say the revelation of God
had scarcely dawned — and find a man who in the midst of those very conditions
was living a godly life. It can be said of him that he was perfect in his generation;
that he walked with God.

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Spiritual Heights of the Patriarchs
We marvel at the spiritual heights to which the patriarchs reached with the
little light they had. It is certainly a sad commentary upon our present period of
enlightenment and Christian standards when we have the entire Word of God
before us and so little genuine spirituality in the midst of it all. That is why this
chapter is such an encouragement to the Christian.
Nothing gives us more encouragement, nor seems to fire us more, and
puts a purpose and a determination into our heart to fight the good fight of faith
and to lay hold of eternal life, than just to read the biographies of these men of
old and consider their godly lives.
The godly life Noah lived was the reason he and his household found
grace and favor in the eyes of the Lord. Because of the ungodly conditions of the
world, the Lord determined the destruction of the entire race of humanity. It had
come to the point where it was enough — they had to be cleaned off the face of
the earth. Men can become so degenerate and so reprobate and so completely
given over to the things of the devil that they are simply a burden.
We see those very conditions existing when the Israelites came into the
Promised Land. The nations that occupied the land had reached a point where
their cup of iniquity was full, and God was ready to destroy them. He chose Israel
for an instrument for that very purpose. Israel failed by not showing enough
regard for the commandment of God, and in not doing the complete job for which
God had chosen them. Because they failed in what God had commanded, and
left remnants of the heathen, the heathen became as God said they would:
thorns in their sides and pricks in their eyes.
In Noah’s time God determined the destruction of all flesh; for their
wickedness had come up before the Lord. Even at that, He did not cut them off
immediately, but gave them 120 years in which they might yet repent and seek
God if they chose to do it. But in those 120 years there is not an intimation that
even one of them ever made a step toward God. That shows the state to which
they had come. They had no place of repentance.
Finally the time came when Noah entered into the ark. Everything was
done, the last tap of work was finished, and he and the beasts that were to keep
life remaining on the earth entered in. We are told that the Lord shut them in. The
same door that shut in Noah and his family shut out the wicked. That spoke the
doom of the world.
Just as that door was shut, so one of these days the Door of Grace will
also be shut, and that will speak the doom of this present race. Jesus said about
the last days:
“But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of
man be” (Matthew 24:37).
Did you ever notice what a remarkable parallel there is between the
present condition and that of Noah’s time? Violence filled the earth, the

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wickedness of man was great, and the earth was corrupted under its inhabitants.
That is a perfect description of what exists right now in the world. These things
make us know that we are right on the verge of the coming of the Son of God.
All that Noah did was done by faith. It was not that he could see anything
at the time. He could not see that this condition was coming about which the Lord
prophesied. He had to see it entirely by faith, and to accept it as God’s Word. It
said that he was “moved with fear.” That was not fear of his own destruction or
that of his family; it was a reverential fear of God — such a fear that he would
never doubt God’s Word. He took God exactly at what He said and and went to
work preparing the ark, when as yet there was no evidence of any flood. It was a
preposterous thing, perhaps, in the minds of the rest of the inhabitants of that
period; nevertheless it came to pass as the Lord had said.

Abraham, the Father of the Faithful

These men of God came along periodically, just like beacon lights. About
four hundred years after Noah, came Abraham in his period; and so on down the
line. There they stand as monuments to God’s saving grace — witnesses to what
faith can do in the human heart. Here is Abraham, and they can well say that he
did what he did “by faith.”
“By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which
he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not
knowing whither he went” (Hebrews 11:8).
And because of it, Abraham is known as the father of the faithful. Abraham
lived before the Law was ever given. He was born and brought up in the land of
Ur, in the southern part of Chaldea near the Euphrates. He was of Semitic
descent, of the line of Shem. Certain descendants of Shem in the early period
had moved over into this valley eastward. Of this line Abraham was born.
Like the usual run of humanity in that day, they were idolaters. Go where
you would, down into the Euphrates Valley, farther north upwards toward the
Tigris, on into the valley, or continue southward into Africa — wherever you
would go there was idolatry on every hand — idolatry carried to the extreme.
Their main god in the land of Ur was known as the “moon god.” Abraham grew
up in this idolatrous surrounding.
From what Stephen, the martyr, says about him in the account in Acts, a
call seems to have been given to Abraham here because he said that Abraham
was called in Ur of the Chaldees. So Terah, his father, with his family started out
for the land of Canaan, and they went northward about four hundred miles to
where Haran was. That is farther north in the Euphrates valley. There they
apparently stopped to rest; and Terah became sick and died. So the call was
repeated.

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 “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” (Genesis 12:1).
It is remarkable that Abraham never questioned the call, never had a word
to say. He made immediate preparations; and his only other kin that showed any
inclination to come along was Lot. So Abraham took his wife and the souls that
they had (servants, no doubt), and started out for the land that they knew nothing
about. The Word says, “And into the land of Canaan they came” (Genesis 12:5). I
like the swing of those words. It sounds as if Abraham meant business, and
came into this land. He did it all by faith.
Abraham was a man steeped in, or at least surrounded on every hand by,
idolatry. He had no influence whatever that could point him to the living God; and
the Lord had to take him up, so to speak, by the roots that he might be
transplanted. He demanded a radical move on the part of Abraham.
Some people complain that this is a radical Gospel. That is a statement of
commendation for it, because it is a radical Gospel. When God begins to move,
things cut decisively; and He demands a radical obedience to His Word. The
remarkable thing about these men of God is that they moved when God spoke,
even if it meant the taking of their very lives. That is what their service to God
meant to them. They never halted, whatever sacrifice it entailed.
I can picture this man Abraham cutting loose from all his surroundings,
from all his associates, from all his family ties; and going out with what few
people there were with him into this unknown land. It meant something for him,
but he did it at the call of God. He came into a country that he knew not. We find
him coming to the east of Bethel. Wherever he pitched his tent he also built an
altar unto the Lord.
One man in remarking about this said, “How few people that build homes
think also of building an altar unto the Lord!” Then he closed saying also, “How
few truly religious people who serve the living God ever have their houses
burned down!” I thought that was quite applicable to the present period when we
are talking about incendiary bombs, and looking to our God for protection.
The first thing Abraham did was to establish an altar. You will notice as
you follow Abraham in his moves that God always came first. Whatever move he
made, wherever he went, you will find him establishing an altar unto the Lord.
That meant that he was establishing worship with God wherever that altar
appeared.
“By faith he sojourned [Sojourn means a temporary dwelling place
for a pilgrim.] in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in
tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise”
(Hebrews 11:9).
The Lord had promised that this land should be his, but throughout
Abraham’s entire life the only possession that he gained in that land was a
burying place — and he bought that with his own money. So he saw none of the

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promises fulfilled so far as he himself was concerned. He counted himself all this
time as nothing but a pilgrim and a stranger. That has become quite a familiar
phrase to Christian followers of the Lord; but a great many use the phrase who,
by their actions rather than by their words, indicate that they are much more at
home in this world than they are with the Lord. It means something to be a
pilgrim and a stranger here below.
This land was to be given to Abraham’s posterity — and Abraham might
well have fixed his eyes upon that land, but Paul tells us what his true outlook
was.
“For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and
maker is God” (Hebrews 11:10).
Let me ask you: Was Abraham’s outlook back there about 1900 B. C. any
different from what God intends it to be in this present period, what the
Christian’s outlook should be? He was a man who was measuring up to the
spiritual standard of the Christian era, the advanced light that we have today with
the Word of God. So far as we know, there was not one line of this Word
committed to writing in Abraham’s period. Whatever he received was what the
Lord spoke to him in the way of a commandment or a word. He never once had
his eyes upon that possession. He knew then, just as well as we know today, that
that land was simply a symbol of God’s better land, of something better that he
had for His people.

Unlimited Blessings
It was true that there were certain temporal promises given Abraham’s
posterity, and blessings that they were to have in this land. And they had them
when they obeyed God; because in order for God to carry out His plan of
redemption, and His purpose that Israel should be the channel through which
that plan was to be revealed to the world, it was necessary that they be
established as a race. Therefore He blessed them materially; but He never
intended that the blessings He gave the Israelites should stop with the Promised
Land, any more than He intends to let the material blessings which He gives us
today be the finish of the whole thing. He expects us to look beyond these, as He
expected Israel to look beyond what they received.
The spiritual men, the men who walked with God and talked with God, and
who had the spiritual outlook, saw beyond the horizon of those temporal
blessings. We do not want to get a misconception of what God’s object for Israel
was, and think that it was purely material, and those were the only blessings they
were to receive; and that we in this period are to receive spiritual blessings. They
were capable of having the spiritual blessings as well as we are today — under,
of course, limited light and a more limited revelation; nevertheless the blessings
were theirs. We find here catalogued the men who took the advantage and
received them. And if these men of God could receive them, all Israel could have
done the same.

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 “These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having
seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and
confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth”
(Hebrews 11:13).
There is something heavenly about those words. They did not come into
possession of the promises that God gave, but they saw them way down the line.
Jesus said, “Abraham rejoiced to see my day.” He saw the coming Messiah, he
saw the Seed that God had promised him down through centuries — not in the
unfolding as it has been revealed to us, nevertheless he saw it; and that was
what inspired him and caused him to rejoice. In some respects, this is like the
Christian period. The saints back in Paul’s day believed the promises of the
Lord’s coming. They did not see it as far off as Abraham saw his promises; they
saw it fairly close. But it was not fulfilled in their day. What was the effect of their
holding to those promises and cherishing them? It prompted a circumspect walk,
a spiritual life and a close walk with the Lord. And it will do the same in our day. It
did for Abraham in his day. If they had abandoned those promises they would
never have attained to them.
“For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a
country” (Hebrews 11:14).
He is referring to the fact that Abraham looked for a city “which hath
foundations, whose builder and maker is God, . . .” and counted himself and his
family as pilgrims and strangers.
“And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence
they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned”
(Hebrews 11:15).
If Abraham had wanted to go back to his kindred and to his country God
would have let him go. Although God gave the promise, it was Abraham’s
privilege to turn back at any time. In fact, he had no more than come into this
large land that flowed with milk and honey, than a famine overtook him: He had
plenty of opportunity to question God’s promise right there, but he did not do it.
He was compelled to go out into the land of Egypt and sojourn there for a period
until the famine subsided.
Faith carried him through all the discouragements and hard places: faith in
God and nothing else. When he could not see, he still believed. He held to the
promises. If there is anything that will fortify us against discouragement, against
those fiery darts of the enemy (and I do not believe there is anything that is more
fiery and sharp and goes deeper than discouragement), it is going to be the
shield of faith. No wonder Paul said, “Above all, taking the shield of faith”
(Ephesians 6:16).
Nothing much has happened to disturb our peace in the years since God
poured out His Spirit. This body of believers has grown; God has blessed it; it
has prospered. It is true there have been trials along the way, but they have been
mostly individual trials. There have been no persecutions to speak of; but

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perhaps before this race is run our faith may be put to the test along some of
those lines. We may have some persecutions before this is over. One thing we
do know is that the diabolical powers that are rising in this world are every day
coming closer to our door. What we need in these days is to be fortified within
with the same faith that fortified those saints of old; and that faith God plants in
the heart of him who puts his trust in God.
“But now they desire a better country, . . .”
There is something even better than that Promised Land with its milk and
honey, its grapes of Eshcol, and all the blessings that it afforded.
“. . . that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called
their God: for he hath prepared for them a city” (Hebrews 11:16).
If he prepared it for them, He has prepared it for us.

The Supreme Trial

There came a time when Abraham met the crisis of his life. And every one
of us will come to the place sooner or later where we will face a clear-cut issue of
going through with God, whatever the cost. Could we go through if it meant the
taking off of our head? or would we back up on the situation?
Abraham reached that place. Right out of a clear sky, after he had waited
for twenty-five years for the fulfillment of God’s promise that in his seed should all
the nations of the earth be blessed, God speaks: “Abraham.” He answered,
“Behold, here I am.” God said: “Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom
thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt
offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of” (Genesis 22:1, 2).
There was the command. What did Abraham do? He arose the next morning,
saddled his ass, clave the wood, took his son and his servants and started out for
Moriah, a three days’ journey. He never halted until he got there. It was there that
he went through with what God commanded him.
“And Isaac spake unto Abraham his father, and said, My father: and
he said, Here am I, my son. And he said, Behold the fire and the wood: but
where is the lamb for a burnt offering?
“And Abraham said, My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a
burnt offering” (Genesis 22:7, 8.)
A great prophecy was made in those words because Abraham was
enacting symbolically, in going up there to Mount Moriah, what was to be
enacted centuries later through that Seed that should bless all the nations of the
earth. He took Isaac and bound him and placed him upon the altar and lifted the
knife. Then the Word of the Lord came to him: “Lay not thine hand upon the lad,
neither do thou any thing unto him: for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing
thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me” (Genesis 22:12).

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 He had not let the thing that lay closest to his heart ever take precedence
over the love that he had for God. He saw to that. If he had not kept Isaac upon
the altar from the very start, he would not have been able to lay him on the altar
when the crisis came; but it was because his consecration was right up to the
mark that he went through with it when it came to a showdown. So far as
Abraham was concerned, that child was slain. He had the confidence that he was
serving a God who, should he fulfill the commandment God had given him, was
able to raise his son from the dead.
“Accounting that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead;
from whence also he received him in a figure” (Hebrews 11:19).
There is much in that offering up of Isaac that carries out in a symbolic
way the great sacrifice that God made. Abraham there symbolized God’s offering
up of His Son. God has given us there just a little human enactment of what took
place in Heaven when He gave His Son.
“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”
(John 3:16).

Moses
“By faith Moses, when he was born, was hid three months of his
parents, because they saw he was a proper child; and they were not afraid
of the king’s commandment” (Hebrews 11:23).
Here is evidence that even the parents of Moses had faith in God. They
had been for almost four hundred years in Egyptian bondage. Throughout that
period there is no evidence that God spoke or manifested Himself, but there were
some who kept in touch with the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob during that
period. It meant something, because they were living in the midst of heathen
idolatry. The ancient Egyptians seemed to hold the palm. They had idolatry in
every form that one could imagine: they worshiped the Nile, they worshiped
animals, they believed in reincarnation, and many other such doctrines which
made them an outstanding nation of idolaters. And yet, throughout that period of
four hundred years there were those who still held to the old faith and believed in
the living God.
Moses’ parents were among that number. They saw that he was a
beautiful child. The edict of the king had gone forth that all male children among
the Israelites should be slain in order that they should not outnumber the
Egyptians. After a certain number of months they were no longer able to hide this
child; something had to be done. By faith they put him into an ark of bulrushes.
Those were vessels that were common in Egypt in that day. They were woven
together of the rushes that grew upon the banks of the Nile, and were used for
various purposes in their daily lives.

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 That mother took one of those vessels and lined it with pitch and put the
little fellow into it and set it adrift in the waters of the Nile. It seems to have been
God’s plan all the way through. How mysteriously He works! Way back there
before anyone knew how Israel was to be delivered out of bondage, or before
there was any intimation that they would ever be delivered, except as that
promise to Abraham stood, God began to work with that little infant.
Shortly after the ark was set adrift upon the water, a princess, Pharaoh’s
daughter, came to the water’s edge with her maids, and they discovered this ark
and took it up. And because Moses was a comely child, they took pity on him.
Anyone would have been pretty hardhearted, even among pagans, who would
not have done so. She took the little fellow for her own son. In the meantime
Miriam, Moses’ sister, a child about nine years old, was hidden in the bulrushes.
She immediately came forth and wanted to know if she should get a nurse; and
with the consent of the princess, she went and brought the mother of the child,
and he was taken care of until he was old enough to be taken into the household
of Pharaoh. There he was educated in all the wisdom of Egypt — that is, the
wisdom of men. They had arts and sciences that to this day have been lost, and
they have never been equaled. The Egyptians had reached a degree of civiliza-
tion in that day that was remarkable; and in their culture, their literature, and their
arts no doubt Moses was trained from his infancy.

A Period of “Higher Education”

But we are told that when he reached maturity, about forty years of age, it
came into his heart to visit his brethren. The Lord put it into his heart. He went
out and saw the oppression and the wrongs that were done. He immediately took
it upon himself to right those wrongs, but prematurely. The Lord did not have him
ready yet for that kind of work.
A great many, in their zeal, will run ahead of the Spirit of the Lord, and
Moses was one of them. He had been put into the court of Pharaoh for a
schooling. It looked as if Pharaoh was educating him, but the Lord had a hand in
it all; and when the time came, He was able to speak to the heart of Moses. It
indicated that this man had in his heart a deep sense of what was right and what
was wrong; and he rebelled against wrongs and injustices that he saw.
That very thing in the heart of a man is something with which God can
work. I have noted in the testimonies which have gone forth in our church from
time to time, that certain ones would say that even while they were in darkness
and in sin they always had a desire to serve God and do the thing that was right.
God works on that very thing. If He can get hold of a man’s heart and reveal the
light to him, and cause that man to bow before Him and call upon Him, He has an
instrument through which He can work, and material that can be put to use.
But Moses sort of upset God’s plans by taking things into his own hands,
and he had to flee the country. His education was not quite finished yet. He fled
down into the land of Midian. That is in the neighborhood of Mount Sinai. God’s

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hand was also in that. There he was tending the flocks of Jethro, whose daughter
he married. He named his first child Gershom, which means a stranger; and he
added, “I have been a stranger in a strange land” (Exodus 2:22).
Thus we see something of what Moses was going through. He had been
cut off from his own people and his kindred, exiled in a foreign land among
strangers, and he had time to think things over when he was out in the field with
the sheep. God had an opportunity to deal with him. He had to go through a
period of humiliation (after having been brought up in the court of Pharaoh)
before his education was finished, and before the Lord was ready to put him to
work.
The time finally arrived when the Lord spoke to him out of the burning
bush and commanded him to go back and bring his people out. Moses
remonstrated. He knew what it meant; he knew what the court of Pharaoh was;
he knew what the power of Egypt was and what he was facing.
“And Moses said unto God, Who am I, that I should go unto Pharaoh,
and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt?
“And he said, Certainly I will be with thee” (Exodus 3:11, 12).
The Lord can use a very humble instrument, which might seem from the
human standpoint a very inefficient instrument, if He can perfect it for His glory.
John Bunyan said, “Would it be so much to be a violin — even a very rare make?
What would a violin amount to unless it were in the hands of a master?” And so it
is with every one of us. We do not amount to very much; our work is crude, and
we are crude instruments until God works with us and through us, and then He
can do something.
He can bring out the notes of music that are heavenly and celestial if He
can have control of our lives. That is what He was seeking with this man Moses,
that He might bring him to the point where He could use him. That is what He is
trying to do with every one of us.
“By faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called
the son of Pharaoh’s daughter;
“Choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to
enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season” (Hebrews 11:24, 25).
And he saw plenty of pleasure of sin in that court; plenty that would entice
the eye; plenty that would appeal to those who had a glamorous turn of mind;
plenty of glitter and plenty of gold. But Moses had something deep down in his
nature that wanted more than that. Perhaps he was an heir to the throne, being
the son of Pharaoh’s daughter. But what do we read?
“Esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures
in Egypt: for he had respect unto the recompence of the reward”
(Hebrews 11:26).
He went back; he did what the Lord commanded. He stayed with it
although he met with opposition and the stiff-neckedness of those Israelites.

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 “By faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king: for he
endured, as seeing him who is invisible” (Hebrews 11: 27).
That is faith!

The Roll Call of Heroes Continued

___Lesson Twenty-one___

“Through faith he kept the passover, and the sprinkling of blood, lest
he that destroyed the firstborn should touch them” (Hebrews 11:28).
Like the other instructions that Moses had concerning what was to come
upon Egypt, he had nothing but bare faith to go by. The Lord commanded, and
he had to act upon faith. When it came to the preparation for the Passover it was
the same way. But Moses had learned obedience. He never varied from those
instructions, except in one instance.
“By faith they passed through the Red sea as by dry land: which the
Egyptians assaying to do were drowned” (Hebrews 11:29).
Moses stood upon the banks of the Red Sea and said, “Stand still, and
see the salvation of the LORD” (Exodus 14:13). They did, and in a mighty way
God rolled back those waters and they went through dry shod.
“By faith the walls of Jericho fell down, after they were compassed
about seven days.”

Faith in Action
In all these instances when God worked, it was by minute instructions and
commands that they acted; and when they acted, God never failed to work. That
is a good part of faith — simply to do what God tells us to do; when God gives a
command, carry it out. Do not try to evade the issue or side-step it, but implicitly
obey every word of it. We need never fear that God will not do His part.
A large portion of faith is action — acting upon what God commands.
Throughout His ministry, when Jesus came into contact with any one who
needed help, He gave that one something to do. To the man who had the
withered arm that hung helplessly by his side for a considerable length of time,
Jesus commanded, “Stretch forth thine hand.” You say, “That is a foolish
command to give to a man with a paralyzed arm.” From the human or the
medical standpoint perhaps it is, but not from God’s standpoint. The very effort
which that man put forth to obey the command Jesus gave him, brought him into
contact with divine power which brought life into that lifeless member. He
stretched forth his hand and was healed.

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 If we are going to receive results from the Lord it will be because we act.
We will do something more than just have a mental acceptance or belief of what
God has for us.
I shall never forget my experience very early in this church, shortly after I
was saved. I was sick and had been so for several days and was constantly
getting worse. One of the ministers came to see me one morning after I had been
prayed for and I was still lying in bed waiting for the Lord to heal me. He said, “If
you ever expect to get well you have something to do. I advise you to get up and
go to meeting.” I did exactly as he said and the Lord healed me that very day and
restored my strength. That was a cue for me. That is not always possible. Some
may be too sick even to act upon it, but there are times when God expects us to
act — to put into practical operation the faith that He has put into our hearts. That
was where the success of Moses came in.
“By faith the harlot Rahab perished not with them that believed not,
when she had received the spies with peace” (Hebrews 11:31).
Rahab lived among an idolatrous people who were strangers to God; but
those many thousands who were in Jericho had the same opportunity that she
had, and it was apparent that they had heard concerning God, because she had.
But out of those thousands there was only one who, with her family, accepted
and believed and received the results.
“And what shall I more say? for the time would fail me to tell of
Gedeon, and of Barak, and of Samson, and of Jephthae; of David also, and
Samuel, and of the prophets” (Hebrews 11:32).
Gideon with his little band of three hundred overcame the vast hosts of the
Midianites who were like grasshoppers for number in the valley. Someone has
likened Gideon’s band to the final battle of Armageddon. It bears a great deal of
similarity. Gideon had no weapons — just the pitchers, the lights; that was all.
They shouted and broke their pitchers and the victory was theirs — the enemy
was routed. In the battle of Armageddon the Lord comes not with weapons of the
flesh, but with the weapons that are mighty, and that great battle is won.
Barak was the one who overcame the Canaanites — enemies of the Lord.
Samson defeated the Philistines, and Jephthae the Ammonites. Then David
finished the job, and the conquest of the Promised Land was brought to a close.
“Who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness,
obtained promises, . . .”
It was Joshua and Caleb who obtained the Promised Land. Why?
Because they believed while the others fainted. God’s promises are given but
they are to be appropriated. He promised this land of Canaan, but the Israelites
had to do something to possess it. That is the way God operates throughout His
entire field of economy with His people. When they perform their part of it, God
works with them. It was just so when the disciples went forth everywhere
preaching, God working with them, confirming the Word with signs following. It is
as if we were taken into partnership with Him. It is because of the fact that we

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have to work to obtain His promises that we appreciate them, and know the
delights of conquest. However, some people do not consider it a delight to be in
a fight and have to go through strife.
James said, “My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers
temptations” (James 1:2). Why? Because if you are not in the battle, nor have
temptations, you win no victories. But some of us have had, here and there, a
little taste of what it means to go through afflictions and come out with the victory,
and have felt the joy of it when we won the victory.
There was Phinehas, who, because of his stand when Israel apostatized,
was given the promise of a continued priesthood. He was the grandson of Aaron.
David, because of his faith and the stand that he took, was given the promise
that through his posterity the Messiah would come; and God fulfilled it.
“. . . stopped the mouths of lions” (Hebrews 11:33).
You notice that every sentence he speaks here is an experience from the
Old Testament, from which he is taking all his examples. There was Daniel who
was shut up in the lions’ den and God delivered him. Paul compares one of his
own experiences with that when he said he had been delivered “out of the mouth
of the lion” when he was delivered from the power of Nero.
Notwithstanding the Lord stood with me, and strengthened me; that
by me the preaching might be fully known, and that all the Gentiles might
hear: and I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion” (II Timothy 4:17).
“Quenched the violence of fire, . . .” (Hebrews 11:34).
The three Hebrew children were delivered from the fiery furnace. I imagine
that when they were in the furnace they were repeating that familiar passage in
Isaiah:
“When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and
through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through
the fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee”
(Isaiah 43:2).
That was their experience to the letter. The Hebrews knew their Bible and
were resting upon the promises of God in that crisis. The Lord brought them
through without the smell of smoke on their garments.
“. . . escaped the edge of the sword, . . .”
Moses speaks of the time when he escaped the sword of Pharaoh, how
the Lord took care of him when he was in the land of Midian. Elijah escaped the
sword of Jezebel. David escaped the sword of Saul. Saul sought him for ten
years, persecuting him, hunting him from cave to cave, from mountain to
mountain. That man’s life was in jeopardy day and night, but the Lord sustained
him and brought him through.
“. . . out of weakness were made strong, . . .”

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 That reminds us of that great army of about three million or more who
came out of Egypt. There was not a feeble one among them. It reminds us also
of Samson’s recovery when he renewed his vows. Samson failed terribly, but
when he was in the treadmill he had an opportunity to do a little meditating, and I
believe he did some praying. The result was that when his vows were renewed
his strength was restored; and with that strength he glorified God by defeating
the enemies of Israel more in his death than he had in his life.
“. . . waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens”
(Hebrews 11:34).
That brings to mind the instance when Joshua went against the
Amalekites. Moses was up on the top of the hill, and when Moses lifted up his
rod the enemy was defeated. Joshua waxed valiant until finally the enemy was
completely routed.
“Women received their dead raised to life again: . . .”
(Hebrews 11:35).
You remember the incident of Elijah’s restoring the widow’s son; also the
Shunammite’s son was raised by Elisha.
“. . . moreover of bonds and imprisonment” (Hebrews 11:36).
Joseph spent two years in prison in Egypt, but he never lost his faith in
God. And Jeremiah was put into a dungeon, but the Lord sent a servant to
provide for him; otherwise he would have perished. The people of the Lord are
sometimes put into a corner; but as I heard a minister once say, “The Lord
always opens up the corner; there is a way of escape.”
“They were stoned, . . .”
Zacharias, the son of Barachias, was one who was stoned. Jesus recalled
that to mind when He was rebuking the Pharisees:
“Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and
scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall
ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city:
“That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the
earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of
Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar”
(Matthew 23:34, 35).
They stoned him to death in the court of the Lord’s house because he
declared the truth faithfully to them. It was not only in New Testament times that
Christians were persecuted, but God’s people have been persecuted down
through the ages. Some have reckoned that there were fifty million martyrs
during the Dark Ages who sealed their testimony with their blood. We in our time
have not gone through much after all.
“. . . they were sawn asunder, [Tradition tells us that was the fate of
Isaiah.] were tempted, were slain with the sword (Hebrews 11:37).

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 You remember the priests at Nob. They and their families — three
hundred in number — were slain to the last man. These priests were men of
God.
“And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received
not the promise” (Hebrew 11:39).
They saw it afar off down through the centuries; but it was not fulfilled unto
them. Not even did the Promised Land fall into Abraham’s hands. It went to his
posterity. The only possession that Abraham ever had in the Promised Land was
a burial place, and he paid for that.

The Baptism of the Hoiy Ghost

“God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us
should not be made perfect” (Hebrews 11:40).
The plan of salvation was not complete until the Holy Ghost was poured
out in the New Dispensation. This was something of which the prophets inquired,
“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” (I Peter 1:12).
Jesus emphasized the importance of the outpouring of the Holy Ghost
when He said that it was “expedient” that He go away so the Comforter could
come (John 16:7-15). He also commanded His disciples not to depart from
Jerusalem, “but wait for the promise of the Father, which, saith he, ye have heard
of me” (Acts 1:4). It was all-important that they receive the mighty outpouring of
the Holy Ghost in their lives — and it is just as important for us today. The
baptism of the Holy Ghost is the greatest distinguishing feature of the New
Dispensation. Jesus said that “the law and the prophets were until John,” thus
making him the last representative of the Old Dispensation; and John spoke of
himself as the “friend of the bridegroom.” We in this Dispensation have the
glorious opportunity of being the Bride of Christ, if we press in and receive the
fullness of the blessings He has to bestow. The Holy Ghost is preparing the Bride
for the Rapture of the Church, when Jesus will be united with the Bride at the
Marriage Supper of the Lamb. How great is our privilege in this Dispensation! We
can be the Bride of Christ!

Running the Race

Now let us take up the 12th chapter of Hebrews:
“Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a
cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so
easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us”
(Hebrews 12:1).

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 This is a picture of an athlete upon the racecourse. It is a beautiful and
striking picture of Christians. They are not on a pleasure excursion; they are not
loitering along on a promenade; they are not just filling in time. They are engaged
in a great contest. Paul likens them elsewhere to warriors engaged in a warfare.
The analogies that are brought out here are true to the Christian life in every
respect.
We have a racecourse depicted, with the contestants upon the course.
Paul speaks of their being compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses. I
do not know but that we can take that literally. Some do. Jesus said, in speaking
in the chapter on the prodigal son:
“I say unto you, that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner
that repenteth,more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no
repentance” (Luke 15:7).
I take it from those words that when a sinner prays through at the altar the
news reaches to Heaven; not only to the Throne, but all over. I imagine that the
vaulted arches of Heaven ring with praise. If Heaven is stirred over one sinner
who repents, I am pretty well convinced that Heaven is very much interested in
the progress he makes after he is converted and how he is getting along. For all
we know, the eyes of Heaven are upon us. We are told in this same Epistle, in
speaking of the angels:
“Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them
who shall be heirs of salvation?” (Hebrews 1:14).
We do not know to what extent the throngs of angels are round about us,
sustaining us, helping us, keeping us; no doubt interested in the progress that
you and I are making. If it is not literal, then we have the historical crowd of
witnesses, which we have just reviewed, for our encouragement. We may
constantly think of them, of their victories, of the race they ran, of the goal they
won and how they came through every step of the way by faith.
He gives us some precepts in running this race, and we need to take them
to heart. The first one is to lay aside every weight. We all know that this is one of
the essentials of an athlete upon the racecourse so that he may be as prepared
as he can be. Paul said that a soldier does not entangle himself. We are not here
to accumulate this world’s goods; we are not here to win anything that this world
has to offer. We are here for the supreme purpose of finishing the work God has
for us, and of excelling in those things to which He has called us, that we might
walk worthy of our vocation. In order to do that, it is necessary to strip for the
race.
We are certainly living in days when we need to hold with a loose hand the
things of this world. It would be a terrible thing to me, after twenty-nine years that
I have been saved, if the Lord should come and I should hear in my ears, “I shall
have to leave him to tend to his business here below; he has too much on his
hands.” I do not want to hear that. I want to know that I am cut loose, that I have

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my affections set upon heavenly things, and that I am not tying myself down with
weights here below.
“. . . and the sin which doth so easily beset us, . . .
Those words “so easily beset us” mean “stationed round about us”;
entrenched, as it were, round about us. The sin to which these Hebrew
Christians were exposed was unbelief, forsaking the Gospel, and apostatizing.
That might not be everyone’s besetting sin, yet there is always something. It
does not mean that when we are delivered from the guilt and power of sin we are
delivered from the presence of it, nor from the temptation of it. We do not reach
that stage in this world. When we get to Heaven there will be no more falling or
backsliding. God is going to see to it that He will have a people schooled here
below so that when we get into Heaven all backsliding will be forever over; there
will be no more of it. That is why He is putting, us through a schooling here
below, getting us ready for that high realm of holiness and righteousness, of
purity, of power, of victory that will forever be ours.
Here is this besetting sin, as it were, entrenched about one. Every one of
us has some besetting sin — one or two things, or perhaps more, which the
enemy is constantly using. It is like a whiplash. Paul said:
“For this thing I besought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from
me.
“And he said unto me. My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength
is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my
infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me”
(II Corinthians 12:8,9).
Do not think that you are on your way out when you are under heavy
temptation and the enemy is assailing, and you are right in the midst of affliction;
you might be on your way to higher ground.
“. . . and let us run with patience the race that is set before us.”
Here is the course out ahead of us with all the afflictions that it promises:
the temptations by the way, the enemy that assails that course. Are we going to
go through, whatever betides? That is the question. Are we going to continue
upon the racecourse? Are we going to continue with that perseverance and
endurance and intrepid spirit that will stick to the thing in spite of men and devils?
One may fall; he may make mistakes; he may go under through some of his
weaknesses, but victory is for the man who will stick to his purpose that he is
going to see the end of the race. God will eventually lead that man to where men
or devils, or powers in earth, or powers in hell, will never overthrow him. He will
have the thing that will stand.
In the second verse of this chapter he gives us an example of one who
completed this course. He is the Author and Finisher of our faith. That word
“author” carried very much the same meaning as he gave us in another part
where he spoke of the “forerunner.”

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 “Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and
stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil;
“Whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made an high
priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec” (Hebrews 6:19, 20).
So He is our Forerunner, the Author and Finisher of our faith; or the One
who has taken the initiative and gone ahead of us as a file-leader. Here we are
filing in behind Him. He has entered into that place above, and finished the
course. Listen to what it says about Him.
“. . . who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, . . .”
(Hebrews 12:2).
I do not believe that the joy He was anticipating was the glory in Heaven,
because He had that glory before He ever came to this world. He speaks of that:
“And now, 0 Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had
with thee before the world was” (John 17:5). What then was the joy? His joy was
to do the will of God which included His mission to this world to lay down his life a
sacrifice. It is told us in this Epistle:
“Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, 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, 0 God” (Hebrews 10:5-7).
And it is written in the Psalms:
“I delight to do thy will, 0 my God” (Psalm 40:8).
So what was His joy? It was doing the will of Him that sent Him. He said to
His disciples, “My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his
work” (John 4:34). We saw the significance of that body that was prepared.
“Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me.” For
what purpose? For a sacrifice to take the place of those Old Testament
sacrifices.
His primary mission in coming into the world, taking on Him flesh and
blood after the seed of Abraham, was that that body should be a sacrifice laid
down so that the will of God might be carried out. That was His delight. “Who for
the joy that was set before him The joy of doing the will of God carried Him
through. For that reason He endured the cross, despised the shame, and is set
down at the right hand of the Throne of God. How much stress He put upon that!
A woman came to Him one time and said how blessed His mother was,
but Jesus immediately replied, “Yea rather, blessed are they that hear the word
of God, and keep it” (Luke 11:28).
“For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners
against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.

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 “Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin”
(Hebrews 12:3, 4).
That is looking back to the 11th chapter where there were plenty who had.
These Hebrew Christians had not come to that place yet, and neither have we.
But may the Lord put into our hearts that thing which would make us be willing to
lay down our lives for the cause.
“And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as
unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor
faint when thou art rebuked of him:
“For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son
whom he receiveth.
“If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for
what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?
“But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then
are ye bastards, and not sons.
“Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us,
and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection
unto the Father of spirits, and live?” (Hebrews 12:5-9).
That is where many fail when it comes to the chastenings, the things
which they go through. Many have become disheartened, discouraged, and have
dropped out of the Christian race.
“For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure;
but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness.
“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 12:10, 11).
He is continuing the figure here of the athlete upon the racecourse who is
exercised that he might win the contest. There is much in the exercise that he
goes through that is not pleasant. It is rigorous, it is strenuous, it is hard to go
through; but it is what fits him for the race. Paul speaks of that:
“And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all
things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an
incorruptible” (I Corinthians 9:25).
“Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees;
“And make straight paths for your feet, lest that which is lame be
turned out of the way; but let it rather be healed.
“Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man
shall see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:12-14).

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 That means following holiness before you are sanctified and following it
after you are sanctified. If you do not follow on you will not retain what you have
very long.
“Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; . . .
He means more than a person backsliding. He is talking of their failing of
the grace presented in the Gospel, as these Hebrew Christians were in danger of
doing. That is, of losing all faith in God’s plan of redemption. That is intimated or
implied by what follows.
“. . . lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby
many be defiled” (Hebrews 12:15).
That root of bitterness is a rising up again of the carnal nature. You can
have that purged out and cleansed away and destroyed; but if the seed of sin is
again planted in the heart that root of bitterness can spring up; it has been
planted there once more. Sin comes in through yielding to temptation. That is
when the seed is planted. More than that, that root of bitterness is contagious.
Let it get started in the camp and many can become defiled (and very quickly
too) by just a little gossip, or loose talk.
“Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for
one morsel of meat sold his birthright” (Hebrews 12:16).
It said that Esau despised his birthright. His birthright was to be in the line
of the Messiah, of God’s blessings that were promised. He said, “What profit
shall this birthright do to me?” (Genesis 25:32). “What profit is God’s salvation to
me?” he might as well have said, or “What profit is it if I serve the Lord?”
“For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the
blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he
sought it carefully with tears” (Hebrews 12: 17).
He coveted the blessing then, but it was gone.
“For ye are not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that
burned with fire, nor unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest,
“And the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words; which voice
they that heard intreated that the word should not be spoken to them any
more:
“(For they could not endure that which was commanded, And if so
much as a beast touch the mountain, it shall be stoned, or thrust through
with a dart:
“And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, I exceedingly fear
and quake:)” (Hebrews 12:18-21).
Now here is Mount Sinai where the Law is given; and there upon the other
hand is Mount Zion.

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 “But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living
God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels.
“To the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are
written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men
made perfect,
“And to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of
sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel”
(Hebrews 12:22-24).
Can you imagine a more perfect conclusion? He takes the Mount where
the Law was given and contrasts it with the New Covenant. The one was material
and the other spiritual.
“See that ye refuse not him that speaketh.”
In the beginning he said, “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). And now he comes right back
to that.
“See that ye refuse not him that speaketh. 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:
“Whose voice then shook the earth: but now he hath promised,
saying, Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven.
“And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those
things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which
cannot be shaken may remain” (Hebrews 12:25-27).
The 12th chapter of Hebrews closes with another exhortation — not a
warning like the others, but a very encouraging exhortation to these Hebrew
Christians following upon the heels of this great catalog of those who won their
victories by faith.
“Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us
have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and
godly fear:
“For our God is a consuming fire” (Hebrews 12:28, 29).

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 ARK OF THE
COVENANT

--------- THE VEIL W

. GOLDEN
ALTAR
GOLDEN . TABLE OF S N
CANDLESTICK
. SHEWBREAD

---------
TABERNACLE

LAVER

BRAZEN ALTAR

OUTER COURT

Not to scale

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