Day 226, Hebrews 8 
The promise of Psalm 110 that God was going to appoint a perpetual
high priest after the order of Melchizedek rather than Levi (highlighted in the
previous chapter) implied the ultimate abolishment of the Levitical priesthood.
This, in turn, implied that a significant part of the Mosaic Law that had
anything to do with the Levitical priesthood would become obsolete. Thus one
could easily see how the arrival of the promised perpetual high priest would
necessitate a complete changing of the Law of Moses. We read in
7:12: "For when the priesthood is changed, of necessity there
takes place a change of law also." That change was nothing less than the
end of the old covenant and the beginning of the new. Jews who were (and are)
in sync with God's plan have made that transition.
This reality becomes even more obvious when we realize that the priestly
ministry under the old covenant was simply a foreshadowing of Christ's priestly
ministry. In this chapter of Hebrews, the author declares that the earthly
tabernacle, for which Moses was given detailed construction plans by God, was a
copy of a tabernacle in heaven (8:5; 9:23-24). Jesus was "a
minister in the sanctuary and in the true tabernacle, which the Lord
pitched, not man" (8:2). Thus, not only is Jesus personally superior
in His priestly office as compared to any former priest, but He also has a
superior ministry to any former priests as well. The high priests of the old
covenant performed their ministry in an earthly, man-made tabernacle. They
stood before a symbol of God's throne in the earthly Holy of Holies to present
the blood of animals. Jesus, however, presented His own blood before God's
throne in the heavenly Holy of Holies.
And it was that superior act in a superior place by a superior
priest---foreshadowed thousands of times by inferior acts in inferior places by
inferior priests---that inaugurated a superior new covenant. That superior new
covenant, just like that superior high priest, had also been promised in the
Old Testament. The author of Hebrews cites such a promise from Jeremiah
31:33-34, arguing that "if that first covenant had been faultless, there
would have been no occasion sought for a second" (8:7). Because God
promised a second covenant, that implied the fact that He found fault with the
first, and naturally anyone who remained under the old covenant when the new
covenant was inaugurated would be missing the mark.
The new covenant has made the old covenant obsolete (8:13). And
we are now obligated to obey the law of Christ and not the Law of
Moses. Any Christian, Jew or Gentile, who is trying to live under the old
covenant is going backwards 2,000 years with God. Those who teach that
Christians are obligated to keep the Mosaic Law might just as well start
sacrificing animals to receive forgiveness of their sins!
Hundreds of years before the inauguration of the new covenant, God
foretold through Jeremiah a few of the benefits that would be enjoyed by those
who would partake of its promises. It would be superior to the old covenant
because God would write His laws on hearts and minds, an inward work that
would result in holy lives. Everyone who experienced that inward work would
"know the Lord" (8:11), because knowing Him is revealed by a
lifestyle of obedience to Him. So we see that hundreds of years before Jesus'
incarnation, God was already revealing the true nature of our salvation and
exposing the false grace that is so often being peddled today, a grace that
doesn't change anyone's behavior.
The apostle John similarly wrote, "By this we know that we
have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments" (1 John 2:3). Knowing
the Lord is synonymous with following His commandments, which was true even
under the old covenant. The Lord also once said through Jeremiah:
Did not your father eat and drink and do justice and
righteousness? Then it was well with him. He pled the cause of the
afflicted and needy; then it was well. Is not that what it means to
know Me? declares the Lord (Jer. 22:15-16).
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