A Commentary in Simple English on the letter to Jewish Christians

CHAPTER 8

Verses 1-6: Jesus is a better priest

The writer says that he has now reached the top point, the 'head', of his whole argument. He has proved that Jesus is our High Priest. Now he is going on to write about three things, which are to do with a High Priest. The first of these is the holy place where the worship of God goes on (verses 1-6). The second is the agreement between God and men (verses 7-13). Then from the beginning of Chapter 9 down to 10:18 he will talk to us mostly about offerings to God for sin.

So Jesus is our High Priest. Other high priests had to stand up to serve God. Jesus sits down with God (see Psalm 110:1 again) because His work is complete. The right hand of God is the place of honour and of power. 'The Majesty in heaven' is God the Father. A 'throne' is the grand seat on which a king sits to show his power. The 'thrones' in Bible times were not like chairs on which there is only room for one person at a time to sit down. A 'throne' was a seat wide enough for one or two other people to sit by the side of the king. (See Revelation 3: 21.) Then he could talk to them quietly. He would share his secrets and his thoughts. God's throne is in heaven.

It will help us to understand verses 2-6 if we begin with the first part of verse 5. There the writer is saying that there is a 'holy place' in heaven. You can find the same thought in the Book of Revelation (Rev 11:19; 15: 5-8). What is in heaven is real. What is on earth is real enough but what is in heaven is more real. A copy of something is not the real thing. It is something less.

So verse 5 tells us that the Jewish priests served God in the Tent or Temple, but this was only a copy of the real Holy Place in heaven. The Tent and Temple were shadows. When there is a shadow there must be a light that shines and also an object. Shadows made by the sun grow longer but weaker as the sun sets. No shadow can last for ever. So God gave a warning to Moses (Exod 25: 40) when Moses was going to make the Tent for the worship of God. God had let him see what the real holy places in heaven were like, and then the things, which Moses made, had to be like them.

Now we are ready to go back to verse 2. Christ serves God in the real holy place in heaven. We are saved because we put our trust not only in what Jesus did for us once long ago when He died on the Cross. We trust Him also for what He does for us now in His life in heaven's glory. All other places of worship are the work of men. They try to copy what the people who make them think the heavenly 'Tent' is like. That 'Tent', God's holy place in heaven, is not a copy of anything else.

In verses 3 and 4, we remember that the work of the High Priest was to offer gifts and offerings. Since Jesus is our High Priest now, He must have something to offer to God. The writer is not quite ready yet to say more than he said in 7:27. Christ offered Himself to God for our sins. There cannot be two High Priests making different offerings at the same time. We know that the offerings which the law laid down came to an end in A.D.70.That was when the Romans destroyed the Temple.

In verse 6, we have three 'better things'. The service of Jesus in heaven is better than the service of the Jewish priests in the Temple. Jesus is our 'Mediator', the go-between or middle-man between men and God, and He is the 'Mediator' of a better Agreement between God and men. It is better than the old 'Agreement' which God gave to Moses. The 'better promises' are the promises that God gives to us. He promises to forgive all our sins. He promises to put His Spirit in our hearts. He promises to bring us to glory and to eternal life. The promise of the old Agreement was that if Israel did what God told them they would live.

Verses 7-13: The better promises

The first readers of this letter wanted to know what these 'better promises' were. So the writer uses some great verses from Jeremiah 31:31-34 to tell his readers this. Jeremiah wrote these words a short time before the Temple was destroyed and the kingdom of Judah came to an end. This was in the year 586 BC. Jeremiah told the people that these sad things were going to happen. Hardly any one would believe him when he told them. In these words he looks beyond his own time to the time of Jesus. He had little to hope for in his own lifetime.

So in verse 7, the writer says that God had promised a new Agreement. This shows that the old Agreement could have been better than it was. What we find in the verses from Jeremiah is that God found fault (verse 8). [8.1]. God will make a New Agreement. [8.2]. Verse 9 tells us a little about the Old Agreement. Then in verses 10-12 we have three great promises.

(a) In verse 10, God promises that He will give His laws to us in such a way that they will be in our minds: we will understand them. We know that it is the Spirit of God who does this in us. But He does more. God's law is not only in our mind; it is also in our heart. In other words, we do not only know what it is that God wants us to do. In our hearts there is the desire to obey God as well. The Law of the Old Agreement was cut into flat pieces of stone (Exod 31:18; 32:19; 34: 1). The Holy Spirit writes God’s law inside us. It is God who makes us His people.

(b) The second great promise is in verse 11. All God's people will know God. They will not need someone else to teach them about God. I like the last part of this verse. There is only one time in the New Testament where the great people are spoken about before the people who do not matter so much. (See Revelation 20:12.) That is at the Day of Judgment. God's way of dealing with people is to begin with the people who do not seem to matter and to work up to the people with honour and power. (See also Revelation 19: 5; 1 Corinthians 1:26-29.) It is good to see when people who have honour become Christians. But if we see first that the lowest and poorest of people put their trust in Jesus we should not be sad. This is what we must expect.

If we are teachers of the Good News, there is something good for us here. When we teach in the name of Jesus we are not alone. We know that the Holy Spirit of God is at work in the minds and hearts of the people who listen to us.

(c) So in verse 12 we find the third great promise. God says He will show grace to His people when they do what is quite wrong. When God 'remembers' something He does not just let it come into His mind and go again. When God 'remembers' sin, He punishes the sinner (Rev 16: 19). When God says that He will not remember our sins, He means that He will never punish us for the wrong we have done. God will forgive us and love us because Jesus gave His life for us. No wonder (verse 13) the Old Agreement is worn out. God's New Agreement is far, far better.

(See I John 1:7; Acts 13:38-39; Ephesians 1:6-7; Colossians 1:13-14; Romans 8: 1; and Isaiah 43:25; Jeremiah 50:20).