Better Ministry, Better Covenant

Would you turn with me to Hebrews chapter 8, it's page 1005 in the Pew Bible, if you

Hebrews 8 · chapter mention

want to turn there, let me encourage you to turn there.

Hebrews chapter 8, this morning we're going to look at verses 1 through 6, and as Matt

Hebrews 8 · chapter mention

mentioned, next week we'll look at the rest of chapter 8, but this morning I just want

to focus in on the first six verses of chapter 8.

Page 1005, let me pray for us as we turn to God and his word.

Father, as we have just sung, we have a complete salvation in your son, our savior, Jesus Christ.

So as we come to your word again this morning, we ask you would help us to see more and more

the beauty of him who is our complete salvation.

Be exalted this morning, Christ, in the reading and preaching and hearing of your word.

We pray this in your name, amen.

Hebrews chapter 8, 1 through 6, the writer says this, now the point in what we are saying

Hebrews 8 · chapter mention

is this, always nice when a writer does that, isn't it?

Makes my job a lot easier.

Now the point in what we are saying is this, we have such a high priest, one who is seated

at the right hand of the throne of the majesty in heaven, a minister in the holy places, in

the true tent that the Lord set up, not man.

For every high priest is appointed to offer gifts and sacrifices, thus it is necessary

for this priest also to have something to offer.

Now if he were on earth, he would not be a priest at all, since there are priests who

offer gifts according to the law.

They serve a copy and shadow of the heavenly things.

For when Moses was about to erect the tent, he was instructed by God saying, see that you

make everything according to the pattern that was shown you on the mountain.

But as it is, Christ has obtained a ministry that is as much more excellent than the old

as the covenant he mediates is better, since it is enacted on better promises.

So one of the TV shows that my two and a half year old son loves to watch is Thomas, the

tank engine.

And if you're not familiar with Thomas, it's a kid show about a bunch of friendly trains

who live and work on the imaginary island of Sodor.

And the sort of life goal of all these trains is to be, as they say, a really useful engine

for the owner, Sir Topham Hatt, who's bald, just like me, so I have an affinity with Sir Topham

Hatt.

And each of the trains is a character with his or her own little personality quirk, as

the unbelievably catchy theme song lets you know, Thomas, he's the cheeky one.

James is vain, but lots of fun.

Percy pulls the mail on time.

Gordon thunders down the line.

Emily really knows her stuff.

Henry toots and huffs and puffs.

Edward wants to help and share.

Toby, well, let's just say he's square.

Poor Toby.

It's embarrassing the number of times I've found myself humming that tune.

And if you know the song, I'm sorry for putting it in your head for the rest of the service.

There are two, there are four, there are six, there are eight.

Gotcha.

You know who you are.

Yeah.

But of course, my son and I don't just watch Thomas.

Thomas, we also love to play with our wooden Thomas train set.

So every once in a while, we'll clear off the dining room table and turn it into a big

wooden train track and we'll race our little wooden engines around and up and down and pull

the little wooden train cars and of course, get into little wooden train accidents.

It's all quite fun.

But then one day, after we had been watching and playing with Thomas for a while, we decided

to go see a real steam engine.

So we drove out to Essex to show Jack the real thing.

And I hadn't been up close and personal with a steam train before either, so I wasn't really

sure what we were getting into.

So as we pulled into the parking lot, I'm humming the Thomas song and ready to see some really

useful engines.

And then I found out that in real life, these things are massive.

We ended up standing right next to it when the whistle blew.

And it didn't just hurt our ears, it sort of shook our guts.

And then as it churned out of the station, you could just sort of see the sheer force and

power of this thing as it slowly began to pull the cars up the line and eventually picked

up speed down the track.

Now, if you can picture in your mind a little wooden toy train and the ferocious, powerful,

gut-wrenching reality of a steam engine, you'll start to get a picture of the contrast that's

at the center of our passage in Hebrews this morning.

And that contrast is actually between two places, between two locations or two spheres.

The one place is the earthly tabernacle that God told Moses to build where the Old Testament

priests had their ministry, which was a copy and a shadow, a representation, a representation

we're told.

It's the toy train, if you will.

And the other place is what our passage calls the true tent or the real tabernacle, the throne

of the majesty in heaven, the very presence of God where Jesus ministers on our behalf.

Not a mere representation, but the ferocious, gut-wrenching, powerful reality itself.

And in drawing this contrast between the earthly sanctuary and the heavenly sanctuary, Hebrews

wants us to see how much more excellent Jesus' ministry truly is.

Because he ministers in a much more excellent place, he achieves a much more excellent ministry

on our behalf.

That's where verse 6 takes us at the end of our passage.

And so this morning, we want to spend some time thinking about just that, the location

of Jesus' priestly ministry for us.

And we want to see how this makes a difference for us today.

Because after all, this letter that we call Hebrews was written to fuel our faithful endurance

in difficult days.

That's the real point of the letter.

So we have to ask, what difference does it make to the church in hard times, in trial,

to your life now, and the difficulties that you face?

What difference does it make to know that we have a holy and faithful high priest, not

on earth, in an earthly sanctuary, but in heaven?

Now, of course, it's hard for us to imagine how strange and how revolutionary the Christian

claims would have been in the first century.

Can't you almost hear certain Jews in the first century asking their fellow Jews who had

placed their trust in Christ, well, okay, if Jesus is the ultimate high priest, as you

claim, why isn't he ministering in the temple in Jerusalem, offering sacrifices, making prayers?

That's where priests belong, in the temple.

And at the same time, you can hear their pagan neighbors too, perhaps a bit confused, asking

pretty much the same thing.

Wait, so you follow this Jesus, and he's your priest?

Okay, but where's your temple?

How does he do me any good if I can't go visit him, and I can't give him my sacrifice to offer

to the gods?

What kind of religion is this?

Those are some of the questions that the earliest Christians would have been asked almost every

single day as others engage them about their faith in Christ.

But you know, isn't it still strange and revolutionary for us today?

Because aren't these some of the same sorts of questions that many today have about Christianity?

Why would you follow someone?

Why would you center your life around someone that you can't see, and you can't hear, and

you can't touch?

What good does that do?

So why is it good news that Jesus is our priest in heaven?

I want to look at three reasons this morning.

Why?

And the first one is this.

If Jesus exercises his priestly ministry in heaven, then that means it's accessible everywhere.

Now get the point that Hebrews is making about the wilderness tabernacle, and by extension,

the Jerusalem temple in verses 4 through 5.

Do you see it there?

He's quoting Exodus 25, 40.

And that's the point in the Old Testament story when God first starts telling Moses and

Israel to begin building the tabernacle, to start building this mobile sanctuary, this

tent that they could tear up and set down as they journeyed toward the promised land.

And eventually, God would allow Israel to build a more permanent temple in Jerusalem, but the

tabernacle and temple are basically functionally and theologically the same thing.

They're continuous.

But notice what Hebrews points out here.

Right in the Old Testament scriptures from Exodus 25, that from the very beginning, that

tabernacle, that temple wasn't meant to be permanent.

It was, he says, just a copy or a shadow of the heavenly pattern that God revealed to Moses

on Mount Sinai.

In other words, just like my son's wooden trains are just a small copy of the awesome reality,

the tabernacle was just a sketch, just a representation, a symbol of something much, much, much greater.

Now, on the one hand, we should realize that this is saying something really positive about

the Old Testament tabernacle, isn't it?

I mean, if we have eyes to see it, the tabernacle was a sketch of heaven itself on earth, a glimmer

of the unspeakable beauty of God's eternal dwelling place in the midst of his people.

Hebrews isn't trying to sort of denigrate the tabernacle.

But he's also saying that for all of that, it wasn't the reality itself.

It was just a shadow.

Could it give comfort to Old Testament believers?

Could it teach them things, true things about God and about God's redemption and about God's

future?

Absolutely.

But it wasn't the thing itself.

It was still full of limitations.

And one of the limitations of the tabernacle, which is obvious when you think about it,

was that it could only be located in one place at one time.

Because it was on earth, you could only get to it in one spot.

So if you wanted to participate in what was happening there, if you wanted to be where the

spiritual action was, so to say, you had to travel to get there.

And at least three times a year, Israelites were required to travel to the temple to participate

in annual festivals.

Just think of the cost and the planning that had to go into such a life and such trips.

Just think of the sorrow if you couldn't go and couldn't be present.

Some of the psalms that we have in the book of Psalms are written by people who, for one

reason or another, are distanced from the temple and can't get there.

And their heart longs to be back in God's presence.

But you see, what Hebrews is saying here, that now, exalted to heaven, seated at God's

right hand, Jesus' high priesthood is exercised in a place that isn't limited to one spot.

That now it's accessible and available everywhere.

And of course, we don't see it that way at first, do we?

To our default way of thinking, Jesus' exaltation to heaven makes him less accessible, right?

He's gone away and now we can't see him.

What good is that?

But that's because we don't have a proper understanding of the relationship between what

the Bible calls heaven and earth.

You see, generally speaking, we tend to fall into two broad ways of thinking about these

things.

On the one hand, there's the broadly sort of materialistic way of viewing heaven and earth,

which basically says that heaven doesn't exist.

It isn't real.

All that matters is earth.

And on the other hand, there's the broadly sort of dualistic way of thinking, which says

that heaven is all that really matters.

And earth is just either an illusion or basically evil or ultimately irrelevant at the end of

the day.

Do you see in your own life how people fall into one of those two categories?

And maybe even our own thinking kind of tends towards one or the other.

But you see, both of these views are incredibly problematic, aren't they?

The materialist still has to admit that there are unseen realities.

After all, take mathematical principles, right?

They are most certainly true, and they undergird the physical world.

And in a sense, they're true independently of the physical world.

If everything suddenly vanished in a black hole, two and two would still equal four.

So it seems that reality isn't just matter, just earth, that there are transcendent realities

after all.

But you know, the other way, the sort of dualist picture of viewing the world is also deeply

problematic, isn't it?

To just say that earth is an illusion.

Doesn't our deep yearning for justice say loudly that the events of this earthly life matter?

And to go a step further, when earthly suffering occurs, who can say that it's just an illusion

and isn't worth weeping for?

So this earthly life must be more than just an irrelevant waiting room

or an illusion that we're waiting to cast aside.

So the materialist view and the dualist view, they're both much too oversimplified

and they're much too problematic to be true.

But there's a third way.

There's the biblical view that's actually much more sophisticated and resonates much more

deeply with our experience.

You see, in the biblical view, heaven and earth are two dimensions that overlap and interlock

to form the whole of reality.

You see, when the Bible talks about heaven in the sense used here, it's not talking about

outer space, it's talking about the place where God dwells in fullness.

Heaven is God's dimension of reality.

That's what Jesus says in the Lord's Prayer, right?

Our Father who art in heaven,

your will be done on earth as it is

in heaven.

So heaven is a way of speaking about

that dimension where God

dwells and where God

reigns.

And that's why Hebrews can say in verse 2 that heaven

is, as it were, the true holy place,

the true tent,

the true tabernacle.

Not because the old one was false or the old one was bad,

but because the old one was a symbol

of the real thing

of God's dwelling.

And as I've said, heaven isn't something that's

far off.

You don't need a spaceship to get there.

No, it actually

presses down and impinges

and intersects

with our earthly side of reality.

So you see, when Jesus ascends to the

Father and takes his seat

at God's right hand

and becomes our minister in the

holy place,

this means that our

priest is not

now limited

to one place.

In the place where he ministers,

it touches on the rest

of reality, on all of it

at once.

And that's why Hebrews,

if you've been following our series,

can tell us again

and again

and again

to draw near to God

through Jesus.

not because he wants us to pack up

and travel to some earthly temple,

but because Jesus,

our great high priest,

has gone into the real

and true sanctuary.

He's forged a path for us

into God's very presence.

Not entering a mere sketch,

but the real deal.

And so now,

no matter where we are,

we can draw near.

And friends,

that means that you don't have to travel

to a certain place

to be nearer to God.

There's no such thing

after the work

of Christ.

There's no such thing

as sacred

space

anymore.

Because if we have a true

and living high priest in heaven,

then any space

is a space

where women and men

can draw near to God.

Now think about

the implications of that.

We've perhaps all visited places

that seem more holy

or spiritual than others,

haven't we?

Places that seem to evoke

awe.

Perhaps an ancient cathedral

with high vaulted ceilings

and impressive

stained glass windows.

Or perhaps a quiet monastery

tucked away

up in the mountains,

far above the chaos

of ordinary life.

Places that seem special.

Places that seem

closer to God.

But friend,

consider

what Hebrews

is telling us.

That a person

praying

at the foot

of their bed

in the name

of Jesus,

a seemingly

commonplace

thing,

that that

is a more

holy

and all-filled

reality

than the most

impressive

cathedral.

That that person

is drawing

closer to God

than if he or she

were to travel

to the most serene

mountaintop monastery.

Friends,

don't underestimate

what Christ

has done for you.

And that means

no matter what place

you find yourself in,

if you turn to God

in Christ,

your prayers

are received

in the very throne room

of the universe,

the very control center

of reality.

You can be gathered

with a few friends

in the basement

of your dorm,

praying for God

to move in the hearts

of your friends.

friends.

You and your spouse

can be pacing

the floors

of your hallway

at 2 a.m.

with your sick child,

praying for patience

and wisdom.

You can be in the middle

of the office,

praying for clarity

about your work

and praying for graciousness

with your colleagues.

You can be on the other

side of the world

on a short-term

mission trips,

or you can be walking

the halls

of your high school.

Friends,

any of these places,

the places where

real-life trials come

and where endurance

is especially needed,

any of these places

can be a place

where heaven

and earth meet

and you draw near

to God

through the faithful ministry

of our heavenly

high priest Jesus.

So friends,

don't be embarrassed

that Christ is in heaven.

Rejoice.

Because if he is in heaven,

then his priestly ministry

is accessible everywhere,

at any place,

to any need.

But you see,

that's not the only reason

why Jesus' heavenly location

is good news for us.

It's also good news

because it means

that his priestly ministry

on our behalf

is always abiding.

As you think about it,

the old tabernacle, right,

was set up by human hands

and made of earthly materials.

And as we've said,

that doesn't make it

inherently bad,

but it does mean

that it wasn't meant

to last forever.

Eventually,

the thing was going

to wear out.

Who knows what

it would have looked like

before they actually

built the temple?

Who knows if any

of the parts

that they originally

built it with

were still the ones?

You know the old

philosophical problem?

If you have a boat

and you keep replacing

the parts,

is it still the same boat?

Who knows what

the tabernacle

would have looked like?

The thing was probably

wearing out perpetually.

And even the temple

in Jerusalem

didn't last forever.

It was torn down.

In AD 70,

the Romans destroyed it.

But you see, friends,

Jesus has entered

a sanctuary

that will never fade

and will never crumble.

No matter what happens

on earth,

no matter what circumstances

arise,

our hope

and our identity

as Christians

cannot be shaken.

Have you thought

about that?

If this building

that we meet in

tomorrow

were to fall

into the ground,

it wouldn't change

one bit

the true essence

of our church.

We'd have to figure out

where to meet next week.

That'd probably

be kind of tricky.

The elders and deacons

would have a pretty

stressful week.

But our worship

would continue

basically unchanged.

And our mission

would continue.

And our identity

would remain the same.

Why?

Because all those things

are rooted in Christ.

And the ministry

he's performing

for us in heaven

isn't blown

or tossed

or hindered

by earthly circumstances.

He certainly cares

about our earthly circumstances,

but none of them

could ever change

or stop

his ministry

for us.

And neither

can it change

or stop

his mission

in the world.

Now, of course,

I realize

there's not a great

probability

that our church

will crumble

into the ground

tomorrow.

Let's hope

that doesn't happen.

But for some of you

here this morning,

I wonder if you do

feel like things

are crumbling

down around you.

Maybe you're

drowning in debt.

Maybe your marriage

is lifeless.

Maybe you're agonizing

over hard decisions

that you face.

Or maybe you're

starting to realize

some unsettling things

about your own heart.

Maybe the image

that you've had

of yourself

as a good person

is starting

to crumble down.

But friends,

earlier in Hebrews,

we saw that

Christ's entrance

into heaven

on our behalf

was like an anchor

for the soul.

Christ is a priest

who lives forever

in a sanctuary

that abides forever.

And that means

if you've placed

your trust in him,

if he is your life,

and for those

communities for whom

he is their life,

that no trial

and no circumstance

can ultimately

tear you down.

not because

he'll necessarily

protect us

or shield us

from all hardship,

but because

he endures

and abides

through all hardship.

That there is

a fixed point

that will not

and cannot change

because he's in heaven.

And you know,

this abiding

means not just

stability

for the present.

Because you see,

the idea of heaven

in the Bible

means not just

God's dwelling place

in the present,

but it also,

in a sense,

points us to the future

that God has in store.

The Old Testament prophets

foresaw a day

when God's glory

would cover the earth

as the waters

cover the sea.

And John in Revelation

saw a day

when heaven

would come down

to earth.

When God would judge

injustice and evil

and vindicate his name

and dwell in the midst

of his people

forgiven

once and for all.

You see, friend,

heaven

is where

the world

is headed.

It points ahead

to the certain future

that God has in store.

And that means

that if Jesus

is our high priest

in heaven,

then he'll be our

high priest

for eternity.

And that means

we can have

a guaranteed

place

in God's new creation,

in the city to come,

as Hebrews will call it.

And it also means,

friends,

do you realize this,

that it means

that as we live

with Jesus

as our king

and as our priest,

that our community

becomes

a foretaste

of the future.

That our life

together as Christians,

worshiping Christ,

relying on his priestly work,

following him

as our king,

friends,

that's the future.

Now,

in and among us,

by his spirit.

Don't think

that the Christian life

is boring.

It might be

ordinary at times.

But friends,

the ordinary life

of a believer

is more glorious

than anything

you could imagine.

So if Jesus

is in heaven,

then what he's accomplished

is abiding.

It never fades.

The quality

of your relationship

and access to God

is not shaken

by circumstances.

And he will usher us

into God's future.

But last reason.

Last reason

why Jesus being

our priest in heaven

is good news for us.

It's not just

that his ministry

is accessible anywhere,

not just that it will

abide forever,

but it also means

that his ministry

is completely

effective.

that it does

what it was

meant to do.

Verse 1 tells us

that we have

a high priest

who's seated

in heaven.

Who's seated

in heaven.

He's sitting down

at God's

right hand.

Now,

being seated

at the right hand

meant typically

to be established

in authority

and in favor.

And this idea

of being seated

at God's right hand

typically points

to Jesus'

kingly identity,

his kingly office.

Princes were

the ones who sat.

Kings were the ones

who sat.

They sat

and they ruled.

But here,

Hebrews wants

to make a point

about Jesus'

priestly ministry,

you see.

Not just is Jesus

seated as our king

with all the rights

and privileges

of a sovereign.

But the one

who is seated,

what is he doing?

He's serving

as our priest.

He's ministering

to us.

And as we'll see

in chapter 10

by sitting down,

Hebrews wants us

to see that Christ's

work is finished.

That it's utterly

and totally sufficient

and complete.

That when he offered

himself,

that single

sacrifice

was enough

to cleanse

and forgive

the sins

of everyone

who places

their trust in him.

And now,

in the position

of utmost authority

and favor

at God's right hand,

Jesus assures us

that he's not only

willing to save,

but he indeed

has the power

and the right

to save

everyone who

comes to him.

You see,

because his sacrifice

wasn't brought

into a mere

representation,

but it was brought

into the reality

itself where it

really counts.

His sacrifice

has been brought

into the very

throne room

of the majesty

on high.

God's right.

And at last,

it atones for

our sins

and takes

God's redemptive

plan forward

and it brings

us peace

with God.

That's what

Revelation 5

was all about

that we read

earlier in the

service.

That the

Lamb,

Jesus,

crucified

for us,

is on the

throne,

exalted,

and is

ransoming

for himself

a people

from every

tribe

and language

and people

and nation.

Now,

friend,

if you're here

this morning

and you're

not a Christian,

I realize

that there's

a lot

in this

passage

that might

seem a bit

strange.

I hope

it's a little

less strange

as we've

been talking

about it,

but in the

end,

it all comes

down to

this,

knowing

peace

with God.

If there

is a God,

then surely

to be right

with him

is what

matters most

of all.

And as

Hebrews goes

on to show

because Christ

is in heaven,

having effectively

atoned for

sin,

he thereby

brings about

a new

covenant

between us

and God

that is a

new basis

for relating

to God.

One that's

no longer

dependent on

our performance

or our

works

or our

righteousness,

but one

that stands

on better

promises,

on the rock

of a better

mediator,

and friends,

the greatest

of those

promises is

that God

will remember

our sins

no more.

Complete

forgiveness

for all

who admit

that they

can't save

themselves

and who

take Christ

alone as

their representative

before God.

Now,

next week,

we're going

to talk more

about this

new covenant

and the

glory that

it is.

But for

now,

here's the

main point

as we read

in verse

one.

Not just

that there

is such

a high

priest,

but that

we have

such a

high priest.

So,

friends,

let me leave

us with

this.

Can you

say that

today?

Not just

that there

is such

a high

priest,

but that

I have

such a

high

priest.

That's the

difference

between

merely knowing

about Christianity

and having

saving faith.

To be able

to say,

not just

there is,

but I

have

Christ,

that I

am his

and he

is mine.

And in the

Christian life,

that's also

what produces

faithful endurance

in the midst

of difficult

days,

not just

knowing that

there is,

but friends

that we

have,

that you

have,

that I

have,

such a

great high

priest.

Such a

priest in

heaven,

who's utterly

accessible no

matter where

you are.

Such a

priest who

is utterly

abiding no

matter what

your circumstances.

Such a

priest who's

utterly

effective no

matter what

your sin.

Friends,

in Jesus,

we have

such a

high

priest.

Let's

pray.

Father,

by your

spirit,

would you

grant us

a deeper

vision in

faith of

our risen

and exalted

and reigning

high priest.

Lord,

help us

to know

the security

and the

joy that

comes from

knowing we

have a

priest not

on earth,

where things

fade and

wear out,

where they're

limited,

where the

benefits only

go so

far.

But,

Jesus,

that we

have you

in heaven

and that

in you we

have every

spiritual

blessing in

the heavenly

places where

it really

counts,

where it

really

matters.

Holy Spirit,

would you

breathe faith

into those

who don't

quite get

it yet,

who aren't

quite seeing

it,

help them

to see.

God,

help us to

repent,

to turn away

from the

things that

we've been

trusting in

your place

and to

cling to

you again

as our

upper and

uttermost.

Lord,

we pray all

this in

Christ's

name.

Amen.