(Continued from page 261.) Heb. 12:22-24.
Mount Zion is the center of earthly blessing, and in connection with an earthly people. We share in its glories, inasmuch as being associated with Christ we, the Church, shall reign with Him (2 Tim. 2:12; Rev. 3:21). But earth and earthly blessing is not our goal, so our passage rises from earth to heaven, to show us our true place and portion. " The city of the living God " (as contrasted with the city of the great king, Jerusalem) "the heavenly Jerusalem." God has prepared for us a city of habitation, and it is where He dwells – His home, the Father's house. God is omnipresent, He fills immensity, but He dwells in heaven; the spirits of little children redeemed, do there behold His face. (Matt, 18:10.) The throne of God and of the Lamb is there; and His servants shall serve Him, and they shall see His face (Rev. 22:3,4). This is our eternal home, and how soon may we enter it! But even now we have come to it. We have '' boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus." "Whom He justified, them He also glorified." In Christ we are already seated in the heavenly places. Heaven has been opened to us through the entrance of Christ into it. And while it is not meant that the passages from Ephesians and Romans just quoted are parallel with what we have before us, they are views of the same subject from another point.
What has one to do with an earthly priesthood, with carnal ordinances, with the law as being under it, who has come to the heavenly Jerusalem ?
(3.) We naturally come next to the inhabitants of this heavenly home; and the lowest grade is mentioned first:the innumerable company of angels, a universal gathering-a pan-angelic assembly. Such clearly seems to be the meaning of this clause, the general assembly describing the angelic host and not the Church. Angels foretold and announced the birth of Christ. They ministered to Him after His temptation; one strengthened him in the garden; two announced His resurrection; and again His second coming (Acts 1:) They are "all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for those who shall be heirs of salvation." (Heb. 1:) They excel in strength; they desire to look into the precious mysteries of the gospel (i Pet. 1:12). Of their nature and character we know now but little, comparatively. Their home, however, is ours; and we shall doubtless know them fully when there, and they will share with us in our divine worship, though they can never know the sweetness of redemption. For He took not hold of angels, but of the seed of Abraham (Heb. 2:).
(4.) Round about the throne, nearer than the angels (Rev. 4:ii) are the company of the .redeemed- kings and priests unto God. Of one part of this company our next clause speaks:the church of the first-born, whose names are written in heaven. The first-born has the place of dignity – of priority over all the other children. So, in His amazing grace, God has put the Church. He has given it to be the Bride, the Lamb's wife, to share His glory, to be forever united to Him in the closest intimacy. To be the exhibition of God's kindness, the vessel of His glory throughout all ages! (Eph. 3:21.) Soon will the Lord present it to Himself, a glorious church, not having a spot or wrinkle or any such thing. And even now we have by faith come into association with that heavenly church,- nay, through grace we are a part of it. What a position! How small do the things of earth seem in comparison with these holy, happy associations.
(5.) But we are brought to God Himself, who, if He be the Judge of all, God over all blessed forever, is also our Father. Sin resulted in departure from God, hiding from Him; and all the sacrifices and ceremonies could not bring us back to Him. But Christ has brought us to God, we are made nigh. "And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the reconciliation." (Rom. 5:2:) We have peace, access and standing in grace; we rejoice in hope of the glory of God, and can even glory in tribulations. As a crown upon it all the living God is now our joy; we can look into His face, by faith, and say Abba, Father. Praises be to His wondrous grace!
(6.) Those who have fought the good fight and have kept the faith, saints of all dispensations who have gone home to the Lord, are now set before us. Not in an unconscious sleep, but in happy rest they are shown to us for our encouragement. They are waiting for their glorified bodies, but are even now perfect. They have reached their home, they sin no more. Here are Abraham, the man of faith; Jacob, the tried and failing one ; David, the man after God's own heart. They have done with earth – its sins and its joys. We belong to that goodly company. Their joys are ours, their rest is ours. How cheering it is, amidst the sorrows, trials, and temptations of the way, to remember that we have come to the spirits of just men made perfect. We see some of them in the eleventh of Hebrews; but the time would fail to speak of all, and we hasten on to look at Him who is set before us in the twelfth chapter.
(7.) Jesus, the mediator of the new covenant. In the midst of the angels, of the church, of the spirits of just men made perfect,- upon the very throne of God is One who has drawn our hearts to Himself. He who died for us now lives for us, interceding in the presence of God for us. The old covenant was the law. Under it man engaged to obey the commandments of God as a condition of blessing. How man failed under that covenant, presented under its most attractive forms and appealing to all motives of self-interest and gratitude, it is needless to say. The cross is at once the witness of the doing away of the old covenant, and the introduction of a new one with Jesus as its mediator. He has fulfilled its conditions, and secured its blessings to us. As nothing depends upon us in it, all upon Him, it can never be done away; it is "ordered in all things and sure." It is to this blessed person we have come,- not to Noah with his renewed earth, not to Moses with his legal covenant. Could we ask more ?
(8.) And upon what does all this blessing rest? What is the ground upon which we, as Christians, stand ? It is " the blood of sprinkling that speaketh better things than that of Abel." Abel's blood cried for vengeance upon his guilty brother; the blood of Christ sprinkled upon the mercy seat, and seven times before it, tells of an accomplished redemption – God's righteousness fully vindicated, every demand of justice met by the sacrifice of our Substitute and God for us. We now, through grace, boldly stand before that blood-sprinkled mercy-seat. Who shall lay anything to our charge? How solid, how firm a standing,- how eternal. On the ground of the blood we are introduced into the holy society and position we have been looking at.
And what is the object of this unfolding of the completeness of the Christian's position ? " See that ye refuse not Him that speaketh " (5:25). Christianity had succeeded upon Judaism. The shadow had given way to the substance. And should they return again to the '' shadow of good things to come," when the good things themselves were before them ? But it is said we are in no danger of going back to Judaism. Let us not be too sure of that. A reformed earth, instead of a returning Lord; a legal gospel of works, instead of an accomplished redemption ; ordinances, seasons, a human priesthood between God and His people,- these are the characteristics of the religion of the day – going, gone back to – yea, beyond Judaism, into self-culture, universal brotherhood of man, with God and His word largely left out. His own, to His praise be it said, are and will be preserved through all this, but how needed is the admonition we have just quoted! And as the Christian's position is laid before us with all its holy associations, its wondrous nearness to God, its blessings, do not our hearts, with Peter, say "Lord, to whom shall we go, thou hast the words of eternal life " ?
As the year closes upon us, and another, darker as far as the world is concerned, opens, let us see what a goodly heritage we have, and stand fast in our lot "till He come."