The sanctuary service of ancient days gave to the people of God an object lesson in the great plan of redemption. The sacrifices offered involved not only the shedding of blood but also the presenting of that blood by the high priest. The death of the sin offering by which the blood was obtained was vital, but so also was the sprinkling of that blood on behalf of the sinner seeking salvation.
The work of the priests, and particularly that of the high priest, was typical of the ministry of Christ Jesus our Lord in His capacity as our great high priest in the heavenly courts. Al though Jesus is a priest "after the order of Melchizedek," and not "after the order of Aaron," the Aaronic priesthood in many ways was typical of his ministry in the sanctuary on high.
Many things in the service of the tabernacle days pointed forward to and were typical of the ever-living and ever-abiding nature of the work of Jesus as our high priest and advocate in heaven. There were the morning and evening sacrifices. These were offered day by day throughout the year, and were of such importance that they were offered regularly morning and evening, even on the special festival days such as the Passover, the Day of Atonement, and other occasions. Every morning and every evening the sacrificial lamb was offered to God, representing not only the consecration of the people to the Lord but also the continual atoning work of the Lamb of God.
Every morning and evening a lamb of a year old was burned upon the altar, with its appropriate meat-offering, thus symbolizing the daily consecration of the nation to Jehovah, and their constant dependence upon the atoning blood of Christ. . . .
"Before the vail of the most holy place, was an altar of perpetual intercession, before the holy, an altar of continual atonement. By blood and by incense, God was to be approached, symbols pointing to the great Mediator, through whom sinners may approach Jehovah, and through whom alone mercy and salvation can be granted to the repentant, believing soul. . . .
"They united in silent prayer, with their faces toward the holy place. Thus their petitions ascended with the cloud of incense, while faith laid hold upon the merits of the promised Saviour prefigured by the atonina sacrifice."—Patriarchs and Prophets, pp. 352, 353. (Italics supplied.)
The morning and the evening sacrifices were called the "continual burnt offering" (Ex. 29: 38-42); it was called also the "daily burnt offering" (Num. 29:6). The Hebrew word Tameed is the word that is here rendered "continual" and "daily." Still another word by which this Hebrew term is rendered is "perpetual." This is found in connection with the incense offered both morning and evening. This is called "perpetual incense before the Lord." (Ex. 30:7, 8.)
There were still other aspects of the temple service that reminded the worshipers of the ever-abiding character of Christ's sacred minis try. Observe for instance the continual shew- bread (Num. 4:7); the continual meat offering (Neh. 10:33); the lamps which were to burn continually (Lev. 24:2-4); also the fire upon the altar, concerning which the divine record says, "the fire shall ever be burning" (Lev. 6:13). The words continual, continually, and ever in these references are also from the Hebrew word Tameed. How appropriate that expressions like these should be used in the early sanctuary days! All this pointed forward to the nature of the work of the divine Son of God in "the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man." Heb. 8:2.
In many places in the book of Hebrews we read of the work of Jesus in the courts of glory. Observe the contrast between His ministry and that of the priests of old. They were "not suffered to continue." (Heb. 7:23.) They brought offerings "year by year continually." (Heb. 10:1.) But He "continued! ever." (Heb. 7:24.) He "ever liveth." (Heb. 7:25.) He has the "power of an endless life." (Heb. 7:16.) Yea, like Melchizedek, He "abideth a priest continually." (Heb. 7:3.)
Four Logical Steps
The plan of salvation was conceived in the great heart of God from the days of eternity. In the outworking of this plan there were certain steps:
1. There was the promise of a Saviour given shortly after the fall of man. This promise was renewed from time to time in the years that followed. The faithful among God's people looked forward to the Coming One the Seed of the woman, the Shiloh to come, the great Messiah of the people of God.
2. Then came the system of sacrifices and offerings. Evidence of this can be seen even in the experience of the first family. Later, in the plan of God, arrangements were made for the sanctuary and its services. The ritual in the tabernacle day by day and on special feast days served to show in a more definite way what the sacrifices meant. The regular daily and yearly offerings were calculated to impress upon His people the spiritual significance of the shedding of blood for the remission of sins. All these sacrifices whether morning and evening, the daily sacrifices for the individual, the sacrifices of the feast days, or the yearly offerings on the Day of Atonement pointed forward to the great antitype, Christ Jesus the Lord.
3. The third step was when the Son of God became the Son of man when God was "manifest in the flesh." (1 Tim. 3:16.) Then divinity was clothed with the robe of our humanity. Then 'the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." This part of the plan of God reached its climax in the crucifixion of our blessed Lord on the cross of Calvary. There type met antitype. There all the shadows of things to come culminated in the true and only efficacious offering and sacrifice for the sins of man. Christ on the cross met the penalty of the broken law of God. There "God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself." There He provided also the sacrifice whereby man, on acceptance of the divine provisions, might be redeemed from the thralldom of sin, made a free man in Christ Jesus, and be saved in the kingdom of God.
4. The fourth step is seen when the Saviour ascends to the sanctuary on high and becomes our great high priest. There He ministers and intercedes on behalf of those who "come unto God by him." There He is the "mediator of the new covenant" and ministers the "blood of sprinkling." (Heb. 12:24.) As His children, we become the elect of God "through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ." 1 Peter 1:2. In the sanctuary on high the precious blood of the Son of God is applied to every soul who, coming with a contrite heart and fully surrendered to the will of God, seeks pardon for sin. Just as the priest in the days of old made atonement for the sinner by sprinkling the blood, so the great antitype ministers His atoning blood, and the sinning soul is freed from iniquity.
The continual ministry of Jesus is overlooked by many. When Protestants left the Roman Church in Reformation days, some things of value were undoubtedly left behind. Those who came out might have brought with them more reverence for the house of God. They might also have brought more of the dignity of worship in Christian song. But the corruptions that had grown up around the celebration of the mass left such deep impressions upon the minds of those who broke away from Rome that the all-important, vital things, such as the sacrifice of Christ and the fact that salvation was by faith and not by works, led them to overlook some of the other aspects of Christian truth.
Many, in their ardent desire to establish what they felt was the truth, maintained that the work of Christ for the redemption of man terminated at the cross. In the Roman Church they had been accustomed to the sacrifice of the mass, which meant to the worshipers every time it was offered that Christ was again sacrificed for sins. So in their eagerness to get away from that thought, they believed that when Jesus on the cross uttered the words "It is finished," this meant that everything God and Christ could do for fallen man was accomplished through the sacrificial death of the Son of God at Calvary.
It is true, of course, that certain things were finished at the cross, but it must be plain to everyone that not all God planned to do for lost mankind was accomplished at Golgotha. If so, why the resurrection from the dead? It was not only the death of Jesus that brought salvation. That was vital in the plan of God, but His resurrection also was vital, for we worship not a dead but a living Saviour. Thank God, He ever liveth. He echoes back from the courts of glory, "I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore." Rev. 1:18. Furthermore, the Saviour today ministers as our high priest in the sanctuary above, and this certainly is part of His great mediatorial work for the human race. Let us observe what one thoughtful writer has mentioned concerning this:
"Jesus is the High-priest and King. He has taken His seat once for all, as King, on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty, and, as Priest, is also Minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle. . . . Christ's heavenly glory is a life of service, not of selfish gratification. Every high-priest serves. He is appointed for no other purpose than to offer gifts and sacrifices. The apostle's readers admitted that Christ was High-priest. But they were for getting that, as such, He too must necessarily minister and have something which He can offer. Our theology is still in like danger. We are sometimes prone to regard Christ's life in heaven as only a state of exaltation and power. ... It is the natural result of superficial theories of the Atonement that little practical use is made by many Christians of the truth of Christ's priestly inter cession. The debt has been paid, the debtor dis charged, and the transaction ended. Christ's present activity towards God is acknowledged and neglected. Protestants are confirmed in this baneful worldliness of conception by their just desire to keep at a safe distance from the error in the opposite extreme: that Christ presents to God the Church's sacrifices of the mass.
"The truth lies midway between two errors. On the one hand, Christ's intercession is not itself the making or constituting of a sacrifice; on the other, it is not mere pleading and prayer. The sacrifice was made and completed on the cross, as the victims were slain in the outer court. But it was through the blood of these victims the high-priest had authority to enter the holiest place; and when he had entered, he must sprinkle the warm blood, and so present the sacrifice to God. Similarly Christ must enter a sanctuary in order to present the sacrifice slain on Calvary." THOMAS CHARLES EDWARDS. The Expositor's Bible (Hebrews), pp. 133-135.
Furthermore, H. B. Swete also fittingly points out in his book The Ascended Christ:
"No aspect of our Lord's heavenly life is more to be insisted upon than His priestly office and work. Popular theology on all sides shows a tendency to stop short at the Cross, that is, at the historical moment when the divine sacrifice was offered. The blessings of our redemption are traced to the Passion with such exclusive insistence as to suggest that they would have been ours if Christ had neither risen from the dead nor ascended into heaven. The whole attitude of the Christian life is affected by this departure from the primitive teaching; a dead Christ instead of a living Lord becomes the object of devotion: the anchor of the soul is fixed in the past and not in the present and future. . . .
"A gospel which ended with the story of the Cross would have had all the elevating power of infinite pathos and love. But the power of an endless life would have been wanting. It is the abiding life of our High Priest which makes His atoning sacrifice operative, and is the unfailing spring of the life of justification and grace in all His true members upon earth." Pages 49-51.
We must ever bear in mind that these two aspects of the work of Christ are vital in the salvation of men. His resurrection to the courts of glory and His ministry in the sanctuary of heaven are necessary to make effectual all that was wrought for us on the cross. This has been emphasized by a number of writers. We quote from James Alexander:
"The priest does not function apart from his sanctuary and until the blood had been presented in the sanctuary the sacrifice was not regarded as complete. . . . This ... is the centre of gravity in Christ's priesthood. The priestly activity in heaven is the making effectual of all that has gone before." A Priest Forever, pp. 174, 175.
Note also the following from the Lutheran Commentary on Hebrews:
"As the high priest with such blood of the sin offering entered into the sanctuary, thereby to sanctify the people, so Christ, the offering for sin, was consumed under the fires of divine wrath and divine love without the city that He might sanctify the people by His own blood brought into the heavenly sanctuary, where properly the offering was made. Symbolically, not the victim, but the use made of its blood effected atonement." Volume 10, p. 512.
Observe also the following from William Milligan in his excellent treatise on Christ's priesthood:
"Neither at the resurrection nor the ascension was His work completed. It is going on now, and it will continue to go on until, so far at least as the present dispensation is concerned, it closes with His manifestation in the glory of the Father, and the kingdom." The Ascension and Heavenly Priesthood of Our Lord, p. 57.
William R. Newell gives very pointed counsel to ministers and preachers of the Sacred Word:
"Alas for those who are told in gospel meetings simply to believe in Christ and His finished work, and are not told of His present priestly work in keeping and caring for His own. . . . Let all true preachers and teachers of the word be careful to speak of this work of intercession in which our Blessed Lord is continually occupied on behalf of His saints. ... If Israel needed a priesthood in connection with their earthly worship, how much more do we need one. . . . We need a priest, and thank God! we have a priest 'a great High Priest over the house of God.' . . . May God give us open eyes, and the humility to recognize our great need our daily need, our hourly need, of His blessed, glorious intercessory work." Hebrews Verse by Verse, pp. 319, 320.
Still further, observe the following paragraph from the pen of Mrs. E. G. White:
"The intercession of Christ in man's behalf in the sanctuary above is as essential to the plan of salvation as was His death upon the cross. By His death He began that work which after His resurrection He ascended to complete in heaven. We must by faith enter within the veil, 'whither the Fore runner is for us entered.' There the light from the cross of Calvary is reflected. There we may gain a clearer insight into the mysteries of redemption. The salvation of man is accomplished at an infinite expense to heaven; the sacrifice made is equal to the broadest demands of the broken law of God. Jesus has opened the way to the Father's throne, and through His mediation the sincere desire of all who come to Him in faith may be presented before God." The Great Controversy, p. 489.
Bishop Westcott, one of the great scholars of a bygone generation, seems to have quite fully understood the nature of the work of Jesus as high priest in heaven. In a review of his book on Hebrews, written in 1891, we read:
"In regard to the priesthood of Christ, He not only affirms again and again that He is a Priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek, but He emphasizes it: 'This Man because He continueth ever hath an unchangeable . . . Priesthood' (chap. vii. 24). And then he affirms that now at this moment He is acting as our Priest. . . .
"And as the priesthood is forever, so the sacrifice is eis to dienekes [forever]. The sacrifice is indeed inseparable from the priesthood. If Christ is a Priest, 'it is of necessity that He have somewhat also to offer.' And that which He offers is 'Himself.' In the passage we have just quoted the author insists that Christ, when He was set down on the throne of the Majesty in the heavens, became 'a minister of the sanctuary . . . and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man.' In the view of the author Christ at this moment is ministering as our High Priest in heaven. But the ministry of the tabernacle was a ministry of sacrifice, and therefore in his view Christ is at this moment ministering His sacrifice. If we recur to his favorite illustration of the day of atonement, ... it yields this result: Christ the High Priest with the blood of His sacrifice is entered into the holy of holies, i.e. heaven itself. He is there at this moment making atonement, and we, His congre gation, are waiting without. We are waiting till He comes forth, which will be at the second advent. Till that time the atonement goes on." The Church Quarterly Review, vol. 32, no. 63 (April, 1891), pp. 17, 18.
Let us thank God for the blessed ministry of our great Advocate on high. Let us labor earnestly for lost souls and seek to gather them into the fold, that they with us might benefit by the wonderful ministry of Him "whoever liveth to make intercession" for the children of God.
"The sprinkled blood is speaking
Before the Father's throne,
Its wondrous power is breaking
Each bond of guilt for me;
The sprinkled blood's revealing
A Father's smiling face,
The Saviour's love is sealing
Each monument of grace."
