THE PRIESTHOOD OF CHRIST.
We have before seen that atone, reconcile, cleanse, &c., signify the same, hence, at this stage he has made an end of cleansing those places. As the blood of atonements for the forgiveness of sins was not sprinkled in the court, but in the tabernacle only, the entire work of cleansing the Sanctuary was performed within the tabernacle. These were holy things, yet cleansed yearly. The holy place within the vail contained the ark of the covenant, covered with the mercy-seat, over-shadowed by the cherubins, between which the Lord dwelt in the cloud of divine glory. Who would think of calling such a place unclean? Yet the Lord provided at the time, yea, before it was built, that it should be annually cleansed. It was by blood, and not by fire, that this Sanctuary, which was a type of the new covenant Sanctuary was cleansed. The high priest on this day "bore the iniquities of the holy things which the children of Israel hallowed in all their holy gifts." Ex. xxviii, 38. These holy things composed the Sanctuary. Num. xviii, 1. "And the Lord said unto Aaron, thou and thy sons, and thy father's house with thee shall bear the iniquity of the Sanctuary." This "iniquity of the Sanctuary" we have learned, was not its own properly, but the children of Israel's, God's own people's, which it had received from them. And this transfer of iniquity from the people to their Sanctuary was not a mere casualty, incident on scenes of lawless rebellion, bloodshed or idolatry among themselves, nor the devastation of an enemy; but it was according to the original arrangement and regular operation of this typical system. For we must bear in mind that all the instructions were given to Moses and Aaron before the erection of the Sanctuary. Provision was made to make atonement for sins committed in ignorance; but not till after they were known, [Lev. iv, 14; v, 3-6,] then of course they became sins of knowledge. Then the individual bore his iniquity, [Lev. v, 1-17; vii, 1-8,] till he presented his offering to the priest and slew it, the priest made an atonement with the blood, [Lev. xvii, 11,] and he was forgiven, then of course free from his iniquity. Now at what point did he cease to bear his iniquity? Evidently when he had presented his victim slain; he had then done his part—Through what medium was his iniquity conveyed to85the Sanctuary? Through his victim, or rather its blood when the priest took and sprinkled it before the vail and on the altar. Thus the iniquity was communicated to their Sanctuary. The first thing done for the people on the 10th day of the 7th month was to cleanse it, thence by the same means, the application of blood. This done, the high priest bore the "iniquity of the Sanctuary" for the people "to make atonement for them." Lev. x, 17. "And when he hath made an end of reconciling the holy place [within the vail, verse 2] and the tabernacle of the congregation, and the altar [or when he hath cleansed the Sanctuary] he shall bring the live goat: and Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions and all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness: and the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities into a land not inhabited [margin, of separation.] Lev. xvi 20-22. This was the only office of the scape-goat, to finally receive and bear away from Israel all their iniquities into an uninhabited wilderness and there retain them, leaving Israel at their Sanctuary, and the priest to complete the atonement of the day by burning the fat of the sin-offerings, and offering the two rams for burnt-offerings on the brazen altar in the court. Verses 24, 25. The burning without the camp of the carcasses of the sin-offerings closed the services of this important day. Verse 27. THE ANTITYPE.—As this legal system which we have been considering was only a "shadow," a "figure" and "patterns," of no value in itself only to teach us the nature of that perfect system of redemption which is its "body," the "things themselves;" which was devised in the councils of heaven, and is being wrought out by "the only Begotten of the Father" let us, guided by the Spirit of truth, learn the solemn realities thus shadowed forth. By these patterns, finite as we are, we may, like Paul, extend our research beyond the limits of our natural vision to the "heavenly things themselves." Here we find the entire ministry of the law fulfilled in Christ, who was anointed with the Holy Ghost and by his own blood entered his Sanctuary, heaven itself, when he ascended to the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens, as "a minister of the [Hagion] Holies," &c. Heb. viii, 6, 2. Paul, after speaking of the daily services in the Holy, and the yearly in the Holy of Holies, says, [Chap. ix, 8,] "The Holy Ghost this signifying that the way of the Holies [Hodon Hagion] was not yet made manifest; while as the first tabernacle was yet standing, which was a figure for the time then present, in which were offered," &c., "until the time of reformation: but Christ being come, an High Priest of the [ten] good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, "by his own blood he entered on or into the holy things. (eis hagia.) Chap. ix, 8-12. The phrase, eis hagia, in verse 12 is the same as that rendered "holy places." [Verse 24.] Hagia, in these two verses, is in the acc. pl. neuter, and governed by the prep. eis which signifies on, into, upon, or among. Hagia, being a neuter adjective, is properly rendered "holy things;" but Hagia, in verse 2, is in the nom. sin. fem. and properly rendered, Holy place. The definite "the," belonging before "good things" in verse 11 and Chap. x, 1, makes the expression mean things "good in themselves, or abstractly good." This shows the perfect harmony of Chap. ix, 11, 12, 23, 24, and Chap. x, 1. The "things" are "good in themselves," "holy," or "heavenly," and in "heaven itself," where Christ has entered as our High Priest to "minister" for us; and those "holy things" "in heaven" are connected with the "greater and more perfect tabernacle," "which the Lord pitched and not man;" the same as the holy things of the first covenant were connected with their tabernacle, [Chap. ix, 1-5,] and all those holy things together make the Sanctuary. The Holies (two) [verse 8] the way of which was not made manifest till the time of reformation, when Christ shed his own blood, belong to his "greater and more perfect tabernacle," spoken of in the next verse. I translate the names literal, because they are not literal in our common version. The Doway Bible has them as here given. The word in Chap. ix, 8, 10, 19, is Hagion, "of the Holies," instead of the "holiest of all;" and shows that the blood of Christ is the way or means by which he, as our High Priest was to enter both apartments of the heavenly tabernacle.—Now if there be but one place in the heavens, as many say, why were there two in the figure? And why, in applying the figure, does Paul speak of two? Perhaps those who "despise the law," and "corrupt the covenant of Levi" can explain this; if not we advise them to abide by Paul's exposition of the matter.
Chap. vi, 19, 20 is supposed to prove that Christ entered the Holy of Holies at his ascension, because Paul said he had entered within the vail. But the vail which divides between the Holy and the Holy of Holies is "the second vail;" [Chap. ix, 3;] hence there are two vails, and that in Chap. vi, being the first of which he speaks, must be the first vail, which hung before the Holy, and in Ex. was called a curtain. When he entered within the vail, he entered his tabernacle, of course the Holy, as that was the first apartment; and our hope, as an anchor of the soul, enters within the vail, i. e. the atonement of both apartments, including both the forgiveness and the blotting out of sins. Those who hold that Christ entered the Holy of Holies at, and has been ministering therein ever since his ascension, also believe, as of course they must, that the atonement of the gospel dispensation is the antitype of the atonement made in the tenth day of the seventh month under the law. If this is so, the events of the legal tenth day, have had their antitypes during the Gospel Dispensation. The first event in the atonement service of that day, was the cleansing of the Sanctuary, as we have seen from Lev. xvi. Then, upon their theory, the Sanctuary of the new covenant was cleansed in the early part of the Gospel Dispensation. Evidence is not wanting that neither the earth nor Palestine, their Sanctuaries was then cleansed. I call them their Sanctuaries, for they are not the Lord's. But if the Lord's new covenant Sanctuary was then cleansed, the 2300 days ended then; but if they are years, which we all believe, they extend 1810 years beyond the 70 weeks, and the last of those weeks was the first of the new covenant or Gospel Dispensation. The fact that those days reach 1810 beyond the 70 weeks, and that the Sanctuary could not be cleansed till the end of those days, is demonstration that the antitype of the legal tenth day is not the Gospel Dispensation; again, if the atonement of that day is typical of the atonement of the Gospel Dispensation, then the atonement made in the Holy, [Heb. ix, 6,] previous to that day, was finished before the Gospel Dispensation began. It has been shown that that atonement was made for the forgiveness of sins, and I have found no evidence that such an atonement was made on the tenth day of the seventh month. The Gospel Dispensation began with the preaching of Christ, and if it is the antitype of the legal tenth day, one of two things is true; either the Saviour, instead of fulfilling, has destroyed the greater part of the law, the daily service of the Holy which occupied the whole year except one day, the tenth of the seventh month; or else he fulfilled the whole law except one-three-hundred and sixtieth part of it before the Gospel Dispensation began, and before he was anointed as the Messiah to fulfill the law and the prophets. One of these two conclusions is inevitable on the hypothesis that the Gospel Dispensation and the atonement made in it, is the antitype of the legal tenth day, and the atonement made in it. Upon which of these horns will they hang? If on the former, the declaration, "I came not to destroy the law," pierces them; but if they choose the latter, it then becomes them to prove that the law, which had a shadow of good things to come, was fulfilled within itself, that the shadow and substance filled the same place and time; also, they will need to prove that the entire atonement of the forgiveness of sin was made before the Lamb was slain with whose blood the atonement was to be made.—Now it must be clear to every one, that if the antitype of the yearly service [Heb. ix, 7] began at the first Advent, the antitype of the daily [verse 6] had been previously fulfilled; and, as the atonement for forgiveness was a part of that daily service they are involved in the conclusion that there has been no forgiveness of sin under the Gospel Dispensation. Such theory is wholly at war with the entire genius of the Gospel Dispensation, and stands rebuked, not only by Moses and Paul, but by the teaching and works of our Saviour and his commission to his apostles, by their subsequent teaching and the history of the Christian Church. But again, they say the atonement was made and finished on Calvary, when the Lamb of God expired. So men have taught us, and so the churches and world believe; but it is none the more true or sacred on that account, if unsupported by Divine authority. Perhaps few or none who hold that opinion have ever tested the foundation on which it rests. 1. If the atonement was made on Calvary, by whom was it made? The making of the atonement is the work of a Priest. But who officiated on Calvary?—Roman soldiers and wicked Jews.
2. The slaying of the victim was not making the atonement: the sinner slew the victim, [Lev. iv, 1-4, 13-15,] &c., after that, the Priest took the blood and made the atonement. Lev. iv, 5-12, 16-21.
3. Christ was the appointed High Priest to make the atonement, and he certainly could not have acted in that capacity till after his resurrection, and we have no record of his doing any thing on earth after his resurrection, which could be called the atonement.
4. The atonement was made in the Sanctuary, but Calvary was not such a place.
5. He could not, according to Heb. viii, 4, make the atonement while on earth. "If he were on earth, he should not be a Priest." The Levitical was the earthly priesthood, the Divine, the heavenly.
6. Therefore, he did not begin the work of making the atonement, whatever the nature of that work may be, till after his ascension, when by his own blood he entered his Heavenly Sanctuary for us.
Let us now examine a few texts that appear to speak of the atonement as passed. Rom. v, 11. "By whom we have now received the atonement." [Margin, reconciliation.] This passage clearly shows a present possession of the atonement at the time the Apostle wrote; but it by no means proves that the entire atonement was then in the past.
When the Saviour was about to be taken up from his apostles, he "commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father," which came on the day of Pentecost when they were all "baptized with the Holy Ghost." Christ had entered his Father's house, the Sanctuary, as High Priest, and began his intercession for his people by "praying the Father" for "another Comforter," [John xiv, 15,] "and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost," [Acts ii, 33,] he shed it down upon his waiting apostles. Then in compliance with their commission, Peter, at the third hour of the day, began to preach, "Repent, and be baptized, every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins." Acts ii, 38. This word, remission, signifies forgiveness, pardon, or more literally, sending away of sins.
To be continued.