A GREAT PRIEST OVER THE HOUSE OF GOD.
Hebrews 10: 21. And having a great Priest over the house of God; let us draw near.
Continuing with the SECOND HALF-PRACTICAL.
Hebrews Chapters 10: 19- 13: 25.
Of a Life in the Power of the Great Salvation.
In the NINTH SECTION
Hebrews Chapter 10: 19-25.
Of Life in the Holiest.
BY THE REV. ANDREW MURRAY
We said before that in the symbols of the Mosaic worship there were specially four things that, as types of the mystery of the coming redemption, demand attention. These are--- the Sanctuary, the Blood, the Way into the Holiest, and the Priest. The first three, all Heavenly things, we have had; we now come to the fourth, the chief and the best of all--- a Living Person, Jesus, a great High Priest over the House of God. The Knowledge of what He has won for me and you, the entrance into the Holiest; of the work He did to win it, the shedding of His Blood; of the Way in which I and you are required to enter into the enjoyment of it all--- all this is very precious. But there is something Better still: it is this, that the Living, Loving, Son of God is there, personally to receive us and make us partakers of all the Blessedness that God has for us. This is the chief point: we have such a High Priest, who sat down on the right hand of the Majesty in the Heavens. Wherefore, having a great Priest over the House (family of relationship) of God, let us draw near.
And what is now the work we need Jesus to do for us? Has it not all been done? The Holiest is Opened. Boldness through the Blood has been Secured. The Living Way has been dedicated to carry us in. What more is there that Jesus has to do for us? Nothing more; it has all been finished, Once and Forever. And why is it then we are pointed to Him as the great Priest over the House of God? And what is it we may expect of Him? What we need, and what we must look to Him for is this, so to work in us that the work He has done for us may be made Real, Alive, within us, as a personal experience of the Authority and power of an Endless Life in which He was constituted Priest. Because He Lives Forever, we read, He is able to save completely. Salvation is a subjective, experimental thing--- manifest in the Peace and Holiness of a heart that He gives. We, our life, our inner man, our heart, our will and affections, are to be delivered from the power and influence of sin, and to taste and enjoy the putting away of sin as a Blessed experience. In our very heart we are to find and feel the power of His Redemption. As deep and strong as sin proved itself to be in its actual power and its mastery within us, Jesus is to prove the triumph of Redeeming Grace within us by His power.
His one work as Priest over the House of God is to bring us into it, and enable us to Live there (a being part of God's family, like our earthly families as they are but symbols or types of His original). He does this by bringing God and the soul into actual harmony, sympathy, intimacy and fellowship with each other. As Minister of the Sanctuary He does all that is to be done in Heaven with God; as Mediator of the New Covenant He does all that is to be done here on earth, in our heart--- the one as effectually as the other. The two offices are united in the one great Priest; in each act of His He unites both functions, to the soul that knows what to expect, and Trusts Him. Every movement in the presence of God can have its corresponding movement in the heart of receptive man.
And how is this effected? In virtue of His union (being conjoined ) with us, and our union ( being conjoined) with Him. Jesus is the Second Adam; the new Head of the New race. He is it in virtue of His real humanity, having in it the Authority and power of true Divinity that fills all and is to be the all in ALL. Just as Adam was our forerunner into death (separation from God's presence emphasis added), and we have all the power of his sin and death working in us and drawing us on, so we have Jesus as our Forerunner into God's presence, with all the power of His death and the Authority and power of His resurrection-life working in us, and drawing and lifting us in with Divine energy into the Father's presence. Yes, Jesus with His Divine, His Heavenly Life, in the Authority and power of the Throne on which He is seated, has entered into the deepest ground of our being, where Adam, where sin, do their work, and is there unceasingly carrying out His work of lifting us Heavenward into God's very presence, and of making God's Heavenly presence here on earth our portion.
And why is it we enjoy this so little? And what is needed that we come to its full enjoyment? And how can Jesus truly be to us a great High Priest, giving us our actual Life in the Holiest of All? One great reason of failure is what the Epistle so insists on: our ignorance of the Spiritual Perfection-truth it seeks to teach, and especially of what the Holy Spirit witnesses of the Way into the Holiest. And what we need is just this, that the Holy Spirit Himself, that Jesus in the Holy Spirit, be waited on, Received and accepted, and Trusted to do the work in Divine power. Do keep a firm hold of this Truth, that when our great High Priest once for all entered the Holiest, and sat down on the Throne, it was the Holy Ghost sent in power into the hearts of His disciples, through whom the Heavenly High Priest became a present and an indwelling Savior; bringing with Him into their hearts the presence and the Love, Faith and Truth of God. That Pentecostal Gift (the true blessing that has been so miss understood because of wrong and even false teaching of man, because of presumptuous ignorance), in the power of the Glorified Christ, is the one indispensable channel of the Authority and power of Jesus' Priesthood. Nothing but the fulness of the Spirit in our daily life, making Jesus' present within us, abiding continually, can keep us in the presence of God as full experience. Jesus is no outward High Priest, who can save us as from a distance. No, as the Second Adam, He is nowhere "if" He is not in us. The one reason why the Truth of His Heavenly Priesthood is so often powerless, is because we look upon it as an external distant thing, a work going on in Heaven above and beyond us. The one cure for this evil is to Know that our great Priest over the House of God is the Glorified Jesus, who in the Holy Spirit is present in us, and makes all that is done in Heaven above for us to be done within us too by the Holy Spirit while we're yet here on earth.
He is Priest over the House of God, the place where God dwells; we are His House, His family. And as surely as Jesus Ministers in the Sanctuary above, He moment by moment Ministers in the Sanctuary within our heart. Wherefore, having, not only in Gift, not only in the possession of right and thought, but in our hearts, having a great Priest over the House of God, let us draw near.
1. Having a great Priest! You know a great deal of Jesus, but do you know this that His chief, His all-comprehensive work, is to bring you near, oh! so near, to God? Has He done this for you? "If" not, then ask Him, Trust Him for it.
2. It is Jesus Himself I want. Himself alone can satisfy me. It is In the Holy faith of Jesus, the compassionate sympathizer, in the Holy Love of Jesus who calls us brethren, that we can draw near to God. It is in a heart given up, with its reception; and Trust and Love and devotion of Jesus, that the presence of God will be felt.
3. We have such a High Priest! Yes, say, I have Him; in all His power and Love He is mine; and yield to Him to do His work in me.
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