Verses 1-2 Now of the things which we have spoken this is the sum: We have such an high priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens; 2 A minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man.
The Apostle Paul sums up in the verses above what he has been sharing with the Hebrew people in order to help them release the old religious system under the Old Covenant into which they had been born and raised, and then fully understand and function in the New Covenant that Jesus Christ has established. So all converted Christian believers have a High Priest who is Jesus Christ our LORD and who rose from the dead bodily and is in Heaven sitting on His throne with all power and authority. As High Priest, He is the minister of the sanctuary where all things are pure and sinless, and He is minister of the tabernacle which has always been in Heaven and to which Moses was given a blue print in order to build a representative tabernacle on Earth.
Application: Where does Jesus Christ dwell? Under the Old Covenant He dwelt first in the tabernacle in the wilderness and then in the Temple in Jerusalem that King Solomon built. Under the New Covenant He no longer inhabits a building or temple. “Howbeit the most High dwelleth not in temples made with hands; as saith the prophet.” Acts 7:48 “God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands;” Acts 17:24 Under the New Covenant Jesus Christ dwells with and in his people. “For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved; we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” 2 Corinthians 5:1 “But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.” 1 Timothy 3:15 The Heavenly tabernacle is now made up of the Israel of God which is the Church, both Old Testament and New Testament saints who have passed from this life into the next which is eternal. Like the Hebrew people of the Apostle Paul’s time, most religious people today have been brainwashed and behavior shaped by false doctrines from their various ‘Christian’ denominations or by false religious institutions. They do not understand the truth and extent of the Gospel message. Because Jesus Christ dwells in His people, we are lively stones that make up His spiritual tabernacle and His presence is with each one of us forever as long as we remain obedient to His Word and faithful. “Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.” 2 Peter 2:5
Verses 3 For every high priest is ordained to offer gifts and sacrifices: wherefore it is of necessity that this man have somewhat also to offer.
The job of the Levitical priests was to offer various gifts and sacrifices to the LORD which the people brought into the tabernacle and then into the Temple when it was built by King Solomon. But Jesus Christ had nothing to offer except Himself.
Verses 4-5 For if he were on earth, he should not be a priest, seeing that there are priests that offer gifts according to the law: 5 Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the tabernacle: for, See, saith he, that thou make all things according to the pattern shewed to thee in the mount.
Remember that when the Apostle Paul was writing this epistle to the Hebrew Christians the Temple system was still in place and the Levitical priests were still performing as usual with the gifts and sacrifices brought in by the people. So according to the Apostle Paul, if Jesus had remained on this Earth, he could not be a priest as there were other men fulfilling that role and offering gifts and sacrifices as ordained by Moses. All of the things that Moses made for worship while in the wilderness came from plans that the LORD gave to him based on what was already in Heaven. The arc of the covenant with its mercy seat was already in Heaven. The tabernacle/sanctuary was already in Heaven. Everything done by Moses under the direction of the LORD was just a shadow of things to come. Jesus fulfilled the Law perfectly and became the final sacrifice for sins. He then rose from the dead and ascended into Heaven as our High Priest so that the entire religious system of the Jews under the Old Covenant was abolished, although it physically was kept going until Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 A.D. by the Romans.
Application: The Scofield false doctrine that states that Jesus Christ will come to this Earth to reign in a revived Jewish system for a thousand years is pure myth. Why? Because Jesus cannot be our High Priest if He were to return to this Earth to establish a kingdom in a super Jewish state. And without a High Priest to make intercession for us, we would not be free from sin, death and Hell. Think about it.
Verse 6 But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises.
So Jesus Christ as High Priest has a ministry that is better than the Levitical priests and He has established a better covenant because the promises of that covenant are better. Why? Because no man or women ever kept the Old Covenant or could keep it. It was impossible because if a man or woman failed in only one point of the Law contained in that covenant, they had broken all of the Law. “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.” James 2:10 Mankind could not be perfect and keep it. Only Jesus Christ was able to keep the entire Law perfectly. But under the New Covenant Jesus Christ has kept the entire Law for us and has paid the price for any failure of His people to keep the Law perfectly. We now have the Holy Ghost/Spirit living within us guiding us so that we do not practice sin as we have the Law written on our hearts. Jesus paid it all and He does it all for us. Furthermore, the Old Covenant was conditional whereas the New Covenant is a declarative statement from the LORD.
Verses 7-9 For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second. 8 For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah: 9 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord.
The Apostle Paul goes on to say that God replaced the first or Old Covenant with a second or New Covenant because the first one did not work. And it only didn’t work because the Hebrew people broke it on a regular basis. God kept His part of the agreement, but the people failed to keep their part of the agreement and so a replacement was needed. That replacement came when God took on flesh and dwelt among mankind with the name of Jesus. Jesus metaphorically took the people of Israel and Judah by the hand and led them out of the land of sin and death and into the hope of a new land in His heavenly kingdom where dwelleth righteousness and life eternal.
Application: Jesus Christ made a New Covenant in His blood which is in place today for all converted, Christian believers. Under this covenant or agreement Christians are no longer under the bondage of the Law, but are under the grace of the LORD.
Verse 10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:
Now, instead of having to go to a Temple or other religious facility to be instructed in the Law of God, it is put into the minds of His people by the Comforter, the Holy Ghost/Spirit of Jesus. And Jesus Christ simplified the Law and the ordinances when He said, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” Matthew 22:37-40
Application: Because the Law of God is in the hearts and minds of believers does not mean that Christians should forsake gathering together. It is by gathering together that Scripture is shared, learned, and better understood. It is by gathering together that Christians encourage each other and pray for each other. “Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another: and so much the more as ye see the day approaching.” Hebrews 10:25. What day approaching? The day that Jesus Christ returns to Earth to judge all and to end time and usher in eternity. It is very obvious by simply looking as current affairs and by comparing them to Bible prophecy that we are living in the last of the last days and that time is soon going to cease. For those who are His people, this is a time of hope and great expectation. For those who are lost, it is a time of fear and perplexity. Should not the servants of Jesus Christ be actively and vigorously sharing the Gospel message with all whom they encounter each day?
Application: Who is the house of Israel today? It is not the Zionist Jews. Jesus pronounced their house to be desolate or empty and without life. “Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.” Matthew 23:38 “Behold, your house is left unto you desolate: and verily I say unto you, Ye shall not see me, until the time come when ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.” Luke 13:35 And since the Jews have rejected Jesus Christ as their Messiah for the past 2000 years or so, they cannot be the house of Israel that covenanted with Jesus Christ. So only those people who have repented of their sins, who have been baptized in Jesus’ name, and who have been filled with His Spirit can claim to be under the New Covenant, and those people are from all nations and all tongues throughout the world. They comprise the Church of Jesus and they are the Israel of God today. Any Jew who converts can also be a part of spiritual Israel, but if they choose to remain under the Old Covenant that has vanished away, they will be lost, plain and simple. No one comes into the spiritual Kingdom of God without Jesus Christ. He is the way, the truth, and the life. “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” John 14:6 He is the door to eternity in Heaven. “Then said Jesus unto them again, Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep. I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.” John 10: 7 and 9 Anyone trying to come into the Kingdom of God another way is a thief and a robber. “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold; but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.” John 10:1
Verses 11-12 And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. 12 For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more.
Application: According to the verses above, everyone who is part of the Israel of God has a knowledge of the LORD naturally as that knowledge is revealed to them by the Holy Ghost/Spirit and is written in their hearts, and so no one needs to teach them to seek and to know the LORD. He will call those whom He chooses and they will respond to Him and have an inner desire to learn of Him and to obey His commandments. Why? Because He first loved them and so they in turn love Him. “We love him, because he first loved us.” 1 John 4:19 How does He love us? He shows us mercy and forgives our sins and iniquities and chooses to forget them forever.
Verse 13 In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away. (Hebrews 8)
The Old Covenant was not working, so Jesus Christ came to Earth and inhabited a body of flesh through which He established the New Covenant, making the Old Covenant obsolete and, at the time of the writing of this epistle to the Hebrew Christians, about to vanish away.
Application: The Old Covenant completely disappeared in 70 A.D. when the Temple in Jerusalem was demolished by fire and leveled to the ground fulfilling Jesus’ prophesy that not one stone would be left upon another. With the Temple gone, the Jewish priesthood was gone, as was the Old Covenant with all its religious and societal ordinances and rituals. So all those who continue to try and live under the Old Covenant system cannot succeed and will not see eternal life in Heaven with the LORD Jesus Christ as they are refusing the agreement He made with His shed blood and are instead clinging to something that does not exist any more.