Ephesians 4:4-6, One hope of your calling: Our calling and our home in heaven.

Class Outline:

Tuesday December 15, 2020

 

All things are under God’s authority. We cannot take anything, but all must be given to us.

 

When we seek to take, sin results and we get ourselves in a dangerous place. So we seek for God’s will in all.

 

Our eternal destiny is heaven, God’s habitation, house, temple, sanctuary.

 

Resurrected humanity of the Son of God entered heaven, promoted to the Father’s right hand.

 

The kingdom of God would now be composed of men who would be in union with the promoted King.

 

And before we get there, our King intercedes for us.

 

The astounding truths of our election, our regeneration through faith in Christ and our blessings from Him contribute greatly to our hope.

 

In HEB 4:14-16, our great high priest passed through the heavens, received all honor and authority, and from there He sympathizes with our weaknesses and encourages us by His presence as our Advocate to draw near to the throne of God with confidence that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need.

 

In HEB 9:11-28 we find that where Christ is in heaven there is a perfect tabernacle, which is our house with Him, not made with hands, not of worldly creation, of which the earthly tabernacle of Israel was a copy.

 

In HEB 7:23-28 Jesus is the one and only High Priest, forever perfect, who always intercedes for us from the right hand of God.

 

Three times in Hebrews we are told that when Christ ascended, He was seated at the right hand of God (8:1; 10:12; 12:2), which is a state described in HEB 2:9 as “crowned with glory and honor.”

 

No Jewish high priest ever sat while executing his office. They were never kings who sit in authority of the state. Our exalted High Priest is both King and Priest. In Him, throne and sanctuary are not in conflict. Affidavit

 

HEB 8:1-6

Now the main point in what has been said is this: we have such a high priest, who has taken His seat at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens, 2 a minister in the sanctuary, and in the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, not man. 3 For every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices; hence it is necessary that this high priest also have something to offer. 4 Now if He were on earth, He would not be a priest at all, since there are those who offer the gifts according to the Law; 5 who serve a copy and shadow of the heavenly things, just as Moses was warned by God when he was about to erect the tabernacle; for, "See," He says, "that you make all things according to the pattern which was shown you on the mountain." 6 But now He has obtained a more excellent ministry, by as much as He is also the mediator of a better covenant, which has been enacted on better promises.

 

“pattern” - tupos = type, copy, or image. The earthly Tabernacle was a copy and shadow of the heavenly house. Now, our calling is living in the true one.

 

HEB 9:24

For Christ did not enter a holy place made with hands, a mere copy of the true one, but into heaven itself

 

We have a position in a home that we have not yet seen. It may very well be that the true tabernacle is both the kingdom of heaven and the Person of Christ Himself. The bodies of men are referred to as temples or tabernacles, Christ referred to Himself as the Temple of God, and in JOH 1:14 it is said that He tabernacled among us. We cannot imagine a world where a location and a Person are one in the same, being both in Him and in His kingdom. The earthly tabernacle is a place on earth and as such has boundaries, but perhaps not so in the heavenly, true, tabernacle, for it is not a place made with hands; but here we are trying to peek into places that are still dark for us now.

 

Heaven is a spiritual world and the place of holiness where only the will of God is done. A heavenly life now is an obedient one.

 

As mysterious as heaven is to us, the way of that home we have seen in the Person of Christ. He revealed it during His incarnation and fully explained it in the New Testament scripture, giving us the Holy Spirit so that we could comprehend its depth.

 

We have all the help we need to live the heavenly life now, before we get there. Paul tells us in Col 3 to keep seeking the things above, and to set our mind upon them. We will not do this automatically. It takes alertness, effort, and fighting a real battle. Our thoughts will not automatically take the way of the heavenly.

 

Then, after this statement in Heb 7-8:6, the writer leads us to the need to remove the first covenant [the Law] and establish the second, the New Covenant, which cannot be broken by any who have entered it. The writer transcribes the words of the New Covenant just as it is found in JER 31:31-34. This is the covenant of the heavenly kingdom, which all believers in this age has entered, though that covenant has only begun to be fulfilled. It will be completely fulfilled at the Second Coming of Christ.

 

Concerning this, John Owen, Puritan scholar writes: “Now, in that most holy place were all the signs and pledges of the gracious presence of God, - the testimonies of our reconciliation by the blood of the atonement, and our peace with Him thereby. Wherefore, to enter into these holies, is nothing but access with liberty, freedom, and boldness, into the gracious presence of God, on the account of the reconciliation and peace made with Him. This the apostle doth so plainly and positively declare, HEB 10:19-22, that I somewhat admire so many worthy and learned expositors should utterly miss of his meaning in this place.

 

HEB 10:19-22

Since therefore, brethren, we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, 20 by a new and living way which [entrance] He inaugurated for us through the veil, that is, His flesh, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.

 

[Owen continues] “The “holies,” (holy place) then, is the gracious presence of God, whereunto believers draw nigh in the confidence of atonement made for them, and of acceptance thereon … For He was Himself both the priest and the sacrifice, the offerer and the Lamb. And as that blood was sprinkled before the ark and the mercy-seat, to apply the atonement made unto all the sacred pledges of God’s presence and good-will; so from this representation of the offering of Christ, of Himself as “a Lamb that had been slain,” in this His appearance before God, doth all the application of its benefits to the church proceed.

 

“There is more in it than merely for our good. It is as it were the appearance of an advocate, a law-appearance in the behalf of others. So is it declared, 1JO 2:1-2.

 

1JO 2:1-2

My little children, I am writing these things to you that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; 2 and He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world.

 

“He will at the end of all present His whole church unto God, with the whole work of His love and grace accomplished towards them. He first presents it unto Himself, and then to God.

 

EPH 5:26-27

that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she should be holy and blameless.

 

“Now He presents them as the portion given unto Him of God out of fallen mankind to be redeemed and saved; saying “Behold I and the children which Thou gavest Me; Thine they were, and Thou gavest them to Me. I present them unto Thy love and care, holy Father, that they may enjoy all the fruits of Thine eternal love, all the benefits of My death and sacrifice.” [end quote]

 

I don’t think that we often enough see ourselves as what we have been made to be and where we stand. We stand in the presence of the throne of the Father because of the blood sacrifice, spiritual death of our Lord and Savior, a resurrected Man seated at the Father’s right hand.

 

Another phrase for this same locale [the house, tabernacle, sanctuary of God] is “through the veil.”

 

HEB 10:19-20

Since therefore, brethren, we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, 20 by a new and living way which He inaugurated for us through the veil, that is, His flesh

 

HEB 6:19-20

This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and one which enters within the veil, 20 where Jesus has entered as a forerunner for us, having become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

 

The significance of the veil tearing asunder when Christ died is apparent. Jesus passed through the veil as our forerunner and we follow. God Himself is unveiled to us and the way of access to Him is thrown wide open. As the high priest of Israel could lay his hand upon the sinner and the other hand upon the sacrifice, so our Lord could lay a hand on both us and the inner sanctuary where God dwells and bring us together forever. When Christ’s flesh was torn, so the veil that separated God and man was also.

 

Heaven is a place of holiness and of peace. There is no conflict.

 

There is not discord, dissension, conflict, or oppression in God’s house. Now, the church is to be just like this.

 

1PE 2:1-5

Therefore, putting aside all malice and all guile and hypocrisy and envy and all slander, 2 like newborn babes, long for the pure milk of the word, that by it you may grow in respect to salvation, 3 if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord. 4 And coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected by men, but choice and precious in the sight of God, 5 you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

 

Our bodies are the temple of God in whom the Holy Spirit dwells.

 

All the terms of God’s dwelling we find in the Bible - temple, tabernacle, habitation, sanctuary, and dwelling place - have a common denominator, or one basic characteristic often specifically expressed, and that is holiness. We were each called that we should be holy and blameless.