Well, today we come in our study of the book of Hebrews to verse 18. of chapter 12. And we're going to be taking the section that that can concludes all the way down through verse 24. And we're returning to a familiar theme that has been. pursued throughout the entire book of Hebrews.
And that is the comparison between the Old Covenant and the new covenant. the superiority of the new covenant to the old covenant. And that indeed has, I suppose, been the main theme of the entire book. That the Messiah promised by the Old Testament prophets has now come. and has inaugurated a new covenant, and therefore the old covenant given in the days of Moses has been fulfilled, it has been superseded, it has been set aside, and no one must consider returning to it again.
Christ inaugurated the new covenant with his blood. And because it has now been inaugurated, because Jesus has come, the Messiah has come. And the new covenant has been inaugurated. It is impossible to find any saving benefit in the old covenant. There was saving benefit there, though it was somewhat obscure, as we shall see in our passage today.
But nevertheless, there is no saving benefit to be found there now. And so the Hebrew Christians who, because of persecution, were being tempted to go back to their ancestral Religion. To the religion that their community of those who had not received Jesus as Messiah. were persecuting them for, because they had received Jesus. They were tempted to go back.
Why don't we just go back? And join our community, join our relatives who are still worshiping under the old covenant, and thereby avoid the persecution which is directed toward those. who have come to Jesus Christ. And the answer is you can't do that, you can't do that. Before Jesus came, there was benefit in the old covenant, but now that he has come, there's no saving benefit there.
You can't do that.
So don't even consider it. Any further? And therefore, the text that we have for today pretty much is a Description of the two covenants and how great is the contrast between them. And so first of all, we will consider Mount Sinai. In verses 18 through 21, And then secondly, we will consider Mount Zion in verses 22 through 24.
And thirdly, we will consider the meaning of this contrast between the two texts.
So, first of all, we will consider Mount Sinai as it is ascribed. In verses 18 through 21, For you have not come to the mountain that may be touched. and they burned with fire. into blackness and darkness and tempest. and the sound of a trumpet.
and the voice of words, so that those who heard it begged that the word should not be spoken to them any more. For they could not endure what was commanded. And if so much as a beast, touches the mountain, it shall be stoned. or shot with an arrow. And so terrifying was the sight.
That Moses said. I am exceedingly afraid. and trembling. Consider Mount Sinai and two things about it primarily. Number one, it was a material mountain.
The mountain that may be touched. And number two, it was a foreboding mountain. And the rest of the verses that we just read describe several things about it that were very Very dark indeed. But first of all, it was a material mountain. You have not.
come the writer of Hebrews says to the Hebrews who have trusted Christ and have come to the new covenant, he says, you have not come. To the mountain That may be Touched. This refers clearly by what is said about it to Mount Sinai. Mount Sinai was located in the wilderness between Egypt and Canaan. And there in that wilderness, when the children of Israel came to Mount Sinai, God met with them.
God gave to them his law. The Ten Commandments, and then the other elements of the law that were attached to it. But it was a physical mountain that could be touched, but during the time when God was speaking to them, it may not be touched, even an animal who touched it at that time. must be put to death. But it was a particular place.
A physical mountain in a physical location, a place that you could in those days, and we could even today go to visit if we wanted to travel to that wilderness area. And we could see it, and we could touch it, and we could consider the physical nature of it. And this is where God inaugurated what the Bible calls the Old Covenant. And you'll notice in the New Testament there are basically two covenants that are emphasized. even though there are other covenants that are described for us in the scriptures.
The covenant that God made with Abraham is one of the most prominent, and so forth. Other covenants. But in the New Testament, particularly the book of Galatians and the book of Hebrews, You'll find the emphasis is upon what is called the Old Covenant and the New Covenant. The Mosaic covenant, the covenant that was given to Moses at this location in Mount Sinai, and then the covenant that Jesus Christ inaugurated with his blood on the very night of his betrayal and before he died upon the cross. And so Mount Sinai, which represents the old covenant that was given to the people of God in the days of Moses.
Was given at a material location, and that represents the physical nature, the material nature. of this covenant and its elements. It was Mount Zion, or rather Mount Sinai, not Mount Zion. Mount Sinai was a material mountain. And secondly, it was a foreboding mountain.
And in verses 18 through 21, there are seven aspects. to consider. Seven words or phrases. that all speak of this foreboding nature. of Mount Sinai.
First of all, this mountain, we are told in verse 18, burned with Fire. And it will go on to describe six more things, blackness and darkness. Tempest.
Sound of a trumpet. Voice of frightening words. deadly barrier and universal terror. We'll look at these in a moment. But I'm going to take time now to read several Relatively short passages from the Old Testament that describe what The writer of Hebrews is listing for us here in this passage.
So let's notice these things, and you'll hear at least some of these repeated. Or maybe I should say preceding what was listed for us in Hebrews chapter 12. But first of all, I will read Exodus chapter 19, verses 16 through 19. Then it came to pass on the third day, in the morning. that there were Thunderings.
And lightnings, there's the... Tempest, the storm. thunderings and lightnings. and a thick cloud on the mountain. And the sound of a trumpet was very loud.
So that all the people who were in the camp trembled. And Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain.
Now Mount Sinai was completely in smoke. Because the Lord descended upon it in fire. Its smoke ascended like the smoke of a furnace. And the whole mountain quaked. Greatly.
And then the blast of the trumpet sounded long. and became louder and louder. Moses spoke. And God answered him, By voice. Did you hear those elements that we read in Hebrews 12?
Or let's read from Exodus chapter 20, verses 18 through 21.
Now all the people witnessed the thunderings. The lightning flashers. the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking. and when all the people saw it, they trembled and stood afar off. Then they said to Moses, You speak with us, and we will hear, but let not God speak with us, lest we die.
And Moses said to the people, Do not fear. For God has come to test you, and that his fear may be before you, so that you may not sin.
So the people stood afar off. But Moses drew near the thick darkness where God was. And finally, Deuteronomy Four. 11 through 13. This is later when Moses Is getting the people ready to go into the promised land, but he reminds them of what took place.
a good many years before at Mount Sinai. And he says, Then you came near. and stood at the foot of the mountain. and the mountain burned with fire to the midst of heaven, with darkness. Cloud.
and thick darkness. And the Lord spoke to you out of the midst of the fire. You heard the sound of the words. but saw no form. You only heard a voice.
So he declared to you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform. The Ten Commandments. that he wrote that he wrote them. on two tablets of stone.
So, these seven words or phrases that describe. the foreboding nature of Mount Sinai. It burned with fire, number one. It was consumed with blackness and darkness number two, which spoke of the Obscurity. of God and of the elements of the old covenant that were being given to him.
that God was being veiled. There was a separation between God and the people that must be understood. Number three, we are told about a tempest, that is a storm, sometimes in some versions translated whirlwind. There was number four the sound of a trumpet that we are told Was a long blast, and the longer it sounded, the louder it came. It became.
It started out and I suppose you might say a A normal decibel level They didn't use decibels in those days, I'm sure, but a normal level. And then it got louder and louder and louder and louder and louder until it was almost impossible for them to stand. The sound of the trumpet. It was driving them away as it increased in volume. We are told number five That they heard the voice of words, and we read in the passages a moment ago that these are the words of God.
They were particularly the declaration of the words of the Ten Commandments. And we're told that that was so frightening to the people. Hearing the voice of God Himself. And hearing what he said But they begged Moses to ask God not to speak to them any further. but rather to be the mediator, to go to God and let God speak to Moses, and then Moses to come and to speak to them.
so that this mediatorial work of Moses and man might soften the the the power and the frightening nature. of the voice of God. And so Again, this foreboding mountain, Mount Sinai. And it was Surrounded by what I guess we could describe as a deadly barrier because. Nobody was allowed to go up on the mountain except Moses.
And if any person touched the mountain, he must be killed, even if an animal touched the mountain. he must, that animal must be killed as well. A barrier. Between God And Men and women a barrier. that could not be crossed.
If it was crossed, it meant certain death. And all of this together, then, coming to the seventh phrase, speaks of universal terror. that takes up all of verse 21. All the people trembled. At what they saw and what they heard at that mountain.
Even, surprisingly, Moses, the mediator of the old covenant, Moses, who was allowed into the presence of God and God spoke to him personally, but even Moses trembled at the They uh terrifying elements that were revealed at Mount Sinai. And this is the normal response of people in the Bible. In those handful of times that God revealed a great measure of his holiness to human beings and always it is accompanied with terror. Think about Isaiah in Isaiah chapter 6, who had a vision of God. in his temple.
And his train filled the temple, and smoke filled the temple. And Isaiah was stricken, and when he saw that, and that was just a vision, but when that came to him, he cried out, woe is me. I'm a man of unclean lips. I live among a people of unclean lips. He was terror-stricken.
By seeing a glimpse of the presence of God in His holiness. And that's only just a portion of God in His holiness. The Bible tells us that God could not reveal His full self. to any person, and that person continued to live. It meant their death, and we see all of that.
in this description of Mount Sinai. and the foreboding nature of Mount Sinai. This description of the giving of the old covenant at Mount Sinai is designed to produce Reverence toward God. and fear toward God.
Now we're going to come in a moment to a description of Mount Zion, which is a much much gladder it's the complete opposite in every way. But before we do that, I I need to protest The thinking of many people today that Thank goodness we don't have to have anything to do with the God of the Old Testament, who's the God of judgment. We can only, we have the privilege of being related to God, the God of the New Testament, who's a God of love. And I simply remind you that there aren't two gods. The God of the New Testament is not different from the God of the Old Testament.
His nature is the same, and the message is the same that we find here in this description of the Old Covenant: namely, that without some provision which God Himself must give us, we could not come into God's presence, we could not be welcomed there, we could not exist there. We would be annihilated to come into the presence of a God who is this holy, and this God ought to be feared, and He ought to be reverenced. Fearing God is not a bad thing.
Now, Christians don't need to tremble with fear in God's presence, but we ought not to lose. This sense of reverence proper fear of godly fear. As we Consider God as we think about God and as we draw into his presence in worship. and in prayer. Consider Mount Sinai.
The nature of that mountain and the old covenant of which that mountain. Uh speaks. But then the text goes on to tell us to consider Mount Zion. And that begins in verse 22. Verse 18 said, For you have not come to the mountain that may be touched.
But verse 22 says, but you have come. to Mount Zion. And to the city of the living God. The heavenly Jerusalem. to an innumerable company of angels.
To the General Assembly and Church of the Firstborn, who are registered in heaven, to God, the Judge of all, to the spirits of just men made perfect, to Jesus, the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel.
So having considered briefly Mount Sinai We now consider Mount Zion. And three things that I would point your attention to here. Mount Zion is number one a heavenly mountain. It involves, number two, a heavenly company. And thirdly, it includes what I will call a heavenly sacrifice.
It's a heavenly mountain. Mount Zion.
Now by implication, Mount Zion Cannot be touched. The contrast between that and Mount Sinai is laid before us here. And Mount Sinai is a mountain that can be touched. It's physical, it's material, it's earthly. Mount Zion, on the other hand, is Spiritual and at least cannot be touched by men upon earth.
When we talk about something being spiritual rather than material, I don't know if we can get an accurate picture of what that means. I'm not sure that it means that it's un that it that it could never be touched in any way. Because of course someday we're going to be there. at the city of heaven, which is represented by Mount Zion. It's a heavenly city as opposed to an earthly one, an earthly location.
It is a heavenly location, but when we're there, We are eventually going to be there in glorified bodies that we would consider to be material. Think of the. Body that Jesus Christ had when he came out of the grave, he spent some time convincing his disciples that this really is a body that can be touched. Feel my hands and the prints of the nails in my hands. Watch me as I take this piece of fish and eat it in your presence.
And so When we think of the difference between material and immaterial, Well, when we say it that way, we tend to think of something that's like a a spirit. It has no material substance to it. But I don't think that's what's being described here. But what's being described here is a Mountain that cannot be touched by those who are upon the earth. It can only be envisioned and can be Can be uh realized By faith, we can see it.
By faith, we can see it afar, the hymn writer said. By faith, we can see it, by faith, we can understand it, by faith, we can embrace it, by faith, we can experience it. But As far as right now is concerned, it's beyond the reach of our touch. It is spiritual. Rather than material, and that's probably a better way to put it, rather than the contrast between.
Material and immaterial, we should see the contrast between material and spiritual and try to get a better understanding of what spiritual means. But it's a heavenly mountain, Mount Zion, that cannot be touched by those upon earth. It involves a heavenly city. Described in verse 22 as the city of the living God, and also described in verse 22 as the heavenly Jerusalem. It is a heavenly reality.
It is a spiritual reality. Though it bears the names of earthly Locations It nevertheless, those locations represent something beyond those earthly locations. We're reading about Mount Zion. And of course there was a physical Mount Zion in the land of Canaan, in the land of Israel. It was the highest elevation.
in the city of Jerusalem. Mount Zion.
And eventually all of the mountain that that the city of Jerusalem uh was built upon Became called Mount Zion, even though originally only the highest part of that location was called Mount Zion. But there is a actual mountain called Mount Zion. And there is an actual earthly city called Jerusalem. But obviously those names have a higher meaning. You don't find a higher meaning of Mount Sinai.
You're not going to find Mount Sinai in heaven. But Mount Zion on earth becomes Mount Zion above. And Jerusalem on earth becomes the heavenly Jerusalem above.
Now, I don't have time to develop this thought, but I think at this point it wouldn't hurt to insert it. This being revealed to us, we need to understand That sometimes, when we read, particularly in Old Testament prophecy, about Mount Zion and about Jerusalem. And we are inclined to focus upon the earthly Zion and the earthly Jerusalem and the promises that God made relating to those things yet future to the Old Testament people of God. We need to at least accept the possibility that maybe the other meaning for Mount Zion is in view. And the other meaning for Jerusalem is in view.
These words, these promises, may have to do not with earthly Zion, but heavenly Zion, not with earthly Jerusalem, but heavenly Jerusalem. But that is another subject for another day, and we therefore must move on. And so, consider Mount Zion, first of all, a heavenly mountain, secondly, a heavenly company. Mount Zion is inhabited by A lot of beings. And first on the list are an innumerable company.
of angels. Verse 22: You have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and then this, to an innumerable company of of angels. That translation, as it's found in my Bible. Is a It's a difficult Greek phrase to know how to translate exactly, but most. Recognize that in that phrase there's something that has to do with festal.
uh clothing, festal array, festal Um behavior. And innumerable In innumerable angels in festal assembly is how one Translation puts it. And so when you come. Two. Through the new covenant, you do this.
The Hebrews had done this. You have come. When you come to this Heavenly Zion. You come into a company of angels who are celebrating in festal array, in festal assembly. They've come together in a great celebration.
Now, angels weren't mentioned in the prior verses that described Mount Sinai, but in. Other places in the Bible, we are told that they were present at that time. When the old covenant was given. In fact, they were involved in the giving of the The law of Moses. Presumably The portions of the law that are beyond the Ten Commandments.
But they are, we're very much involved in that. But the angels who were assembled At Mount Sinai and could not be seen by those who were there because all they could see was the physical aspects. We're not in festal array. They were not celebrating. They were Part of this Foreboding picture that we have.
But when we by faith, and we by the provision of the new covenant, Enter in to Mount Zion in heaven above, we come into the company of innumerable angels, more than we could count. And they're all in They're all dressed for for celebration. And they are all involved in celebration. This is a very different picture than the gloom, the darkness, the forebodingness of Mount. Sinai.
It's the exact opposite of that. And we will When we actually arrive. in this heavenly Zion. We will worship along with the angels. I don't know if we give that much thought.
We think in terms of worshiping with all of the people of God. But the first Company of people who are worshiping God that we will be involved with in that day and worshiping is the angels. Imagine that. Being caught up, being in the presence of an innumerable company of celebrating angels who are praising God. In the way that only angels are capable of praising God, and we are involved with that worship as well.
We're caught up in it too. An innumerable company of angels. The heavenly company, however, includes more. We're told in the next verse that it involves the general assembly of the church of the firstborn. The General Assembly The very word church, the Greek word ecclesia, means.
An assembly. A church is an assembly of believers. The emphasis upon assembly. We have assembled here today. And churches all over the world today are assembling to worship God.
One day All of God's people, all born-again people, are going to gather together in a great assembly in heaven. at Mount Zion. And again, I can't imagine how many people is that? I get the impression it's got to be millions. down through the ages and all over the world.
Millions of born-again believers. How do you even Take in such a vast assembly. To us today, if we were in an assembly like that, we could only see a small portion of it. We really couldn't. Couldn't uh take Take in the vastness of it.
But I take it that in heaven we'll be able to do that. And this is added to the innumerable company of angels, and now we have an innumerable company. of people the assembly of the church. of the firstborn.
Now, this brings us to the idea of the firstborn son from the Old Testament, the one who received the. the the blessing and the the greatest portion of the inheritance. That blessing, which we looked at last Sunday, that Esau despised because he didn't appreciate spiritual things and therefore gave up his birthright for. A bowl of stew. But in heaven, we're going to find an innumerable company of redeemed people.
The General Assembly of the Church of the First Board. Who are registered in heaven, that is, whose names are all written in the Lamb's Book of Life. When we get there. The books will be opened. There's your name.
Come in, you're welcome, you're part of this. Come on in. And We'll be there with this great company of people. And All of us, all millions of us, will be, as it were, counted as the firstborn. the one that receives the inheritance.
And that's because of our Connection to Jesus Christ. We are in Him. And He is the firstborn of the Father, and He gets all the Father's inheritance. But the Bible tells us that We are Joint heirs with Jesus Christ. We inherit what he inherits.
And again, that's mind-boggling. I can only say these things. I really can't grasp them. I can't understand the fullness of them. But the point is that this General Assembly.
of the firstborn in heaven are those who have been Redeemed by the blood of Christ, and are granted the greatest honors and blessings and and uh riches and inheritance that all Belong to Jesus Christ, but are gladly shared with His people that He has redeemed. and belong to us, therefore, as well. And there we are. in that great company. And then thirdly, we're told that we come to God the judge of all.
Now when those People in Moses' day came to Mount Sinai and had this sense of God the judge of all, they were terrified. When we come to heaven, we come to God, the judge of all. But the terror is gone. as we sang in Top Lady's hymn this morning. The Judgment has nothing to do with me.
It still will be a terrible judgment for those who have not trusted in Christ, but it will not be a terror to me. We're going to come to the judge. The righteous, thrice holy judge of all the universe, and yet will come and join the angels in their festal celebration as we rejoice together. with all the other people of God and with all of the angels rejoicing in the salvation that Christ has has prov has granted, Christ has brought about in the lives of all of these people. and will stand before the judge of all the earth.
with the perfect confidence that we are there. With a standing that equals that of Jesus Christ himself, standing with a perfect righteousness before the judge of all the earth. Nothing. Nothing there to fear. See the contrast between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant, the contrast between Mount Sinai and Mount Zion?
The spirits of just men made perfect. We read also in verse Twenty-three. That's a pretty good description of those who are in heaven now, right? They are not in their glorified bodies yet, and won't be until Jesus returns and raises the bodies of his people and turns them into glorified bodies. And then we'll live forever with the Lord.
As spirit and body, glorified bodies in heaven, but now those who are in heaven. Are spirits that are perfectly justified. No sin, none, it's gone, not even possibility of sin. Those. Spirits in heaven, the spirits of just men made perfect, can't even have a sinful thought.
And we'll be there. We've come to that. We haven't experienced that part of our redemption yet. But we've come. to the heavenly Jerusalem and to these truths.
And finally we come to Jesus. The mediator of the new covenant, the one who secured all this. By his Sin was life, And that sinless perfection, that sinless record imputed to those who trust in him. That Substitutionary death And the payment for our sins that He took upon Him And so our sins, as it were, were imputed to him and his righteousness imputed to us. And boy, that makes all the difference in the world.
I mean, that makes all the difference in eternity. I mean, that makes all the difference. That you can imagine, and this stark contrast between the old covenant with its judgment upon sinners who have.
so far no provision to come into the presence of God. Are now joyfully entering the presence of God with celebration. and with joy and without fear. It's a heavenly mountain, it's a heavenly company, it's a heavenly sacrifice. We're told in verse 24.
We come to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant. and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel. the blood of sprinkling. The old covenant, Was he inaugurated by the sprinkling of the blood of sacrificial animals. Exodus 24:6, and Moses took.
Half the blood. and put it in basins. and half the blood he sprinkled on the altar. Then he took the book of the covenant, and read in the hearing of the people, and they said, All that the Lord has said we will do. And be obedient.
which none of them did. And none of them could. And Moses took the blood, sprinkled it on the people, and said, This is the blood of the covenant which the Lord has made with you according to all these words. And so the old covenant was inaugurated with the sprinkling of the blood of the sacrifice on the people, upon the altar.
Well, this new covenant also Is inaugurated with, as it were, the sprinkling of the blood. The sprinkling is a figure I think carried over from the activity that occurred in the Old Testament. It's a blood of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel.
Now, that is an interesting phrase. Because since this whole contrast is between the Mosaic covenant as opposed to the new covenant, you'd think the writer would have said the sprinkling of the blood which speaks of better things than the blood of Aaron. Or the blood of these sacrificial animals. In the old covenant. But he doesn't.
I'm going to remind you as to what what he does say and what the meaning of that is. I'm not quite so certain as to tell you why he doesn't mention The blood of Aaron and the old covenant sacrifices, as we might have expected him to. But I tend to think it's because even though Those sacrifices In themselves, they did not save, they pointed to the way of salvation so clearly. In other words, pointing to the necessity of a perfect lamb whose blood was shed.
So that those who believe the promises of God will be Be completely cleansed from sin, and those Old Testament sacrifices couldn't do that, but they were pointing to that.
So perhaps the writer of Hebrews didn't want to give anybody the idea that those Old Testament sacrifices had no value in their time. Which time has now passed? Old covenant times have now passed, if the new covenant has come. But he says instead this blood of Christ speaks better things than the blood of Abel.
Well, what did the blood of Abel do?
Well, let's read about that. Remember, Cain killed Abel, and that goes back to Genesis chapter 4. And he said, What have you done? God speaking to Cain when he said, where is Abel your brother? He said, I do not know.
Am I my brother's keeper? And he said, what have you done? The voice of your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground.
So now you are cursed from the earth. which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand.
So what does the blood of Abel speak of? It speaks of judgment. It speaks of vengeance. What does a blood? Of the Christ the mediator speak of.
It speaks of forgiveness. It speaks of cleansing. Undeserved. Cleansing. undeserved forgiveness.
It's not a blood that says you're Sins must be punished. Your wrongdoings must be avenged. as the blood of Abel said. to Kane. But this blood says Your sins Have been dealt with.
They have been cleansed. They are gone as far as the East is from the West. They will rise up to judge you, to condemn you no more. Praise God, hallelujah. A heavenly sacrifice, not because it was made in heaven, but because.
Being made on earth, its purpose, its value was before the judge of all the earth and heaven above.
Now, let's consider some things about the meaning of this text with the contrast of the old. Covenant and the new. Mount Sinai as opposed to Mount Zion. And I would say this is teaching us that the law condemns, but the cross redeems. It teaches us that God cannot be approached by sinful men.
And the law In the Old Covenant, reveals man's sinfulness. The law, we are told, is our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ. The more we consider the law, the more we understand the law, the more we try to keep the law, the more sinful we realize ourselves to be. No wonder when they heard the voice of God speaking the Ten Commandments, they said, We can't stand it. We can't stand it.
It condemns us so badly. It judges us so harshly. We can't stand it. Moses, you talk to God and come and tell us what he says. We can't stand.
His voice. We can't stand. this law that condemns. But by contrast, In Christ, Any sinner. can come into the presence of God.
The vilest sinner Can come into the presence of God. In Christianity. The Old Covenant depicts the separation of men from God. and therefore the need for a means of reconciliation. The new covenant welcomes men into the presence of God and reveals the only way of reconciliation.
Old covenant believers, please note this: Old Covenant believers in the promises of God. were reconciled by the cross of Christ which had not yet occurred. But if they didn't get beyond The Foreboding elements of the Old Covenant to see the spiritual. truth that was revealed. Yeah.
The recognition, the revelation of their sinfulness, and then the reconciliation that was portrayed in the animal sacrifices of the coming Redeemer. If they didn't get to that point, then There was only condemnation. But old covenant believers in the promises of God were reconciled by the cross of Christ. That's why we find someone. As far back as Job, who most Bible scholars believe predated Moses quite a ways.
But Job talking about, I know that my Redeemer liveth, where did he get that in understanding? That doesn't sound like Mount Sinai, does it? It sounds like Mount Zion. He had some understanding of that. He believed that.
He was saved by the cross of Christ. that must await Some thousands of years before it would actually occur, but nevertheless, he was saved. By that provision, because he believed the promises of God. To the extent that The truth was revealed to him. There was a lot that was not revealed to him, but what he was revealed, he believed, and therefore he was as much.
Saved as we are, and he's now part of that company of justified spirits made perfect in heaven. Waiting for us to join him there, and likewise, so many others of the old covenant believers. But the law condemns, the Christ, the cross redeems. Number two, The material is temporary, the spiritual is eternal. The Old Covenant was designed to be temporary and replaced.
The new covenant is designed to be permanent and irreplaceable. The Old Covenant was fulfilled and terminated when the New Covenant was inaugurated. The old covenant, therefore, no longer relates Men to God. It did. Under the old covenant.
promises looking forward to the coming of the Messiah. The people of God in the Old Testament who who came under the old covenant. related to God as the people of God. But no longer. Can anyone Be related to God by the terms of the old covenant because the new covenant has come.
The material is temporary, the spiritual is eternal. And then, thirdly, things material are easier to understand than things spiritual. That's a lesson I draw from this. Unconverted men can understand material things pretty well. But only spiritual men can understand spiritual realities.
Now who are spiritual men? And of course when I say men I mean men and women.
Well, the Bible tells us the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God, their foolishness unto him. Neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned, spiritually understood. Therefore, how does a man who we are told does not and cannot understand The things of the Spirit of God, how does such a person come to believe on Christ, to believe the gospel? Unless He is first. Made Spiritual.
The work of the Holy Spirit comes to him to enable him to believe. It took me a while to understand that truth, but when I understood it, what a change that made. in my understanding of Scripture, my understanding of salvation. Nobody. believes on Christ.
Until first. The Holy Spirit makes them A spiritual person regenerates them. They experience a new birth. And the first, the very first result of that is faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now they believe because now they can believe.
Now they understand because now they can understand. Whereas apart from that, they could not and would not believe. Because they could not believe. Unconverted men can understand the material, but only spiritual men can understand spiritual realities. Spiritual realities, which are often portrayed through things material, such as Mount Sinai, such as the animal sacrifices, such as the altar of sacrifice.
New covenant worship minimizes, however, material objects and rituals. It loomed large under the Old Covenant because those are things that even unconverted people can understand. and which will point them to spiritual truths if they will see them. But new covenant worship minimizes material objects and rituals. In the new covenant, there is no temple.
except the people of God. There are no altars. If you go to a church and they say, come to the altar, you say, I can't find that. I'm not, I don't live in Jerusalem with the temple. That's where the altar is.
There is no altar in the New Covenant. Right. There is no altar. alter except The cross that we come to In faith and bow there before the Lord Jesus Christ. There are no sacrifices and so forth.
There are only two material practices that are given to us in the New Covenant. Water baptism and the Lord's Supper. And we must not add to what God has given, and we must not subtract from what God has given. God has given us water baptism. It's a Ritual of a material substance, and it points to a spiritual reality.
God has given us the Lord's Supper, likewise. As a material substance that points to a spiritual reality. Those two ordinances, if you are a new covenant believer, then you are obligated under instructions by the Lord Jesus Christ to participate in these two. material ordinances which have been given. Take that seriously.
If you're a believer, then you believe what Jesus said.
So believe him in these matters. And don't add to what God has given. You don't need. All the other ceremonies and rituals that sometimes are added. But you must not subtract from that which God has given.
If you think you have been saved, By the work of the Holy Spirit, then you are obligated to be baptized with water as a profession of your faith. If you are a born-again baptized believer, then you are obligated. to partake of the Lord's table as he has commanded. But the crux of all of this is that salvation is found in Jesus alone. Not in human works or merit.
Not in the rituals. of Mount Sinai. Not on the ceremonies of the old covenant. But by the life and death of Jesus alone. By the inauguration of the new covenant, the By faith.
In Christ. Salvation is by grace alone. Through faith alone, in Christ alone, amen. Let's pray. Father, these are wonderful truths.
Help us by your Spirit to understand them and to apply them. to believe them. and to live in the light of them, we pray. Yeah. And what comes next?
Okay.
