As I said in the previous lessons the book of Hebrews is all about the contrast between the Torah Law given by Moses and the covenant of the Spirit given through the broken body and blood of Christ. Our complete focus as a New Testament priest must be on Christ, however as Paul said we can learn from the Old Covenant Law.
What I want to do in the next few lessons is go back to the blueprint of the Tabernacle of Moses to teach you how you can use this as a pattern for your personal devotion unto God. Hebrews 8:5 tells us that the physical temple was a copy and shadow of the heavenly things. Let me say that again. The physical temple was a copy and shadow of the heavenly things. So that means if we want to touch the heavenly realm where Christ dwells, we can look at the pattern that God showed Moses. It is a blueprint for spiritual truth that if we come to understand, it will help us to tap into the spiritual heavenly realms where Christ dwells.
Moses was told to make everything according to the pattern that was shown to him. Just as the Tabernacle had to be made in a specific way, so the priests had to perform their service in a prescribed manner, which was the pattern of worship for the priest under the Old Covenant. I you want to take a look at the picture of the Old Covenant High Priest. Now when the High Priest was dedicated into office at the age of thirty, he was baptized in the Bronze Laver and then all of his priestly clothes were placed back upon him. They then took a flask of anointing oil and poured it from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet. As New Covenant priests we follow the same pattern.
At the Bronze Altar we are baptized into the body of Christ by identifying with the blood of the cross. We are then to be baptized into water totally identifying with his death, burial, resurrection and ascension to the throne of grace. We are then to be filled with the Spirit. Just as the High Priest had oil poured on him in a like manner, we should desire the oil of the Holy Spirit to be poured upon our lives. You will see also that upon the high priest's head was a hat, which was called a mitre. On the front of this mitre there was a gold plate, which said “Holiness unto the Lord”. In I Peter 1:15-16 it says that “like the Holy One (Jesus) who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior because it is written, ‘YOU SHALL BE HOLY, FOR I AM HOLY’”. God is looking for a holy priesthood.
The sacrifice of our bodies is the starting point for holiness. According to Romans 6:12-13 our bodies will either become the instruments of legalism and lawlessness or the instruments of God's holiness. The determining factor is the decisions that we make daily. It’s God’s will for us to be completely His and that’s the only way we can become instruments to be used by God. In verse 19 of this chapter, it says we do this by presenting the members of our body as slaves of righteousness.
It was estimated that as much as 60% of the Roman world was made up of slaves. Slavery denotes servitude and subjection. Paul used this analogy telling us that we must subject our bodies to the blood, water and Spirit making them subservient to righteousness. Righteousness is simply being forgiven and put in a right relationship with the Father by the cross of Christ. Actually, living the cruciform life is what gives us liberty from sin and brings restriction to the fleshly desires of the lower nature at the same time. Mercy, judgment and holiness meet at the cross. Justification or its synonymous term righteousness has to do with moral standing before God, the result of forgiveness, which assumes the shedding of blood.
Israel’s history and theology developed around the promised land, the covenant, the temple and its sacrifice system.
The sacrifice system was established for the purpose of cleansing sin and making worshipers morally acceptable in the sight of God. This redemption was accomplished by the transference of sin from the worshiper to the animal, while the innocence of the animal that shed its blood was credited to the worshiper (Lev. 5:6 and 7: 18). The animal was accepted on the worshiper’s behalf. Guilt and innocence, forgiveness, and righteousness were inextricably bound to sacrifice.
In such a light, the death of the Messiah was understood sacrificially in the New Testament as a sin offering and those who put their faith in him as a sacrifice will be justified, declared righteous in God’s sight. Paul stated his wholehearted desire to be found in him, not having a righteousness of his own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith. (Phil. 3: 8–9). Such crediting of righteousness or justification derives directly from the sacrificial system, which was the commonly understood framework for the death of the Messiah.
It is on this clear understanding that we see the righteousness of God was simply the revelation of God’s sacrificial offering of the Messiah which established the innocence and forgiveness of the worshiper. So, to put it simply then justification means that we have been acquitted.
We are all lawbreakers, and we all deserve punishment, but the good news is that Christ took our place. He justified us or acquitted us of all of our crimes so when the Father looks upon you, he sees the blood covenant and in Christ you are made right, cleansed, forgiven and given freedom from sin, but not the freedom to sin. Let me say that again that through the sacrifice of Christ we are given freedom from sin, but not the freedom to sin. It is for that reason that the end result of presenting our bodies to the understanding of the cross as a living sacrifice will be sanctification or holiness.
In Romans 6:19 the word in the Greek used for sanctification is hagiasmos. Hagiasmos means not only the activity of the Holy Spirit to set man apart unto salvation, but also enabling him to be holy even as God is holy. However, sanctification requires action on our part and the action is that we must daily present our bodies as living sacrifices and renew our minds because that gives us the power to be set apart as part of the royal priesthood.
Under the New Covenant we are not merely to have ‘Holiness unto the Lord’ written on our foreheads, but as priests we are to have the mind of Christ (I Cor. 2:16).
Colossians 3:2 instructs us on how to accomplish this task and it is by setting our minds on things above, not on things of the earth. But what does it mean to set our minds on things above? To set our minds on things above is to look to our heavenly High Priest Christ, who has overcome. We must daily remind ourselves of the promises He has given us in His word (Heb. 2:1). The battlefield is the mind. We live in an age of information warfare where we are daily being bombarded with the fiery darts of the enemy.
I’ve taught you in previous lessons that the inner part of man is the spirit and soul, which is the eternal part of man.
The body of man is temporal made of the dust of the earth and is what connects us to this earthly realm. Our spirit through new birth is made in the image and likeness of God and it is where the Spirit of God fills our hearts connecting us to the spiritual or heavenly realms. The soul is what people experience from your life through your emotions, your intellect and your determination or your will. The soul is the interface of the spirit. The soul and spirit are so intricately connected that Hebrews 6:12 says that only the word of God, which is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, can pierce the division of soul and spirit.
The soul is made up of the mind, will and emotions. Our souls can be damaged as we walk along life’s journey groping around in this present darkness. It’s the soul where we have emotional wounds. If we don’t allow God to heal the wounds of our soul, then those wounds can affect the channel of faith from fully flowing through our hearts. As I said, the soul is the interface of the spirit.
Computers are something that most of us understand in today’s culture so let me explain interface to you because I think it will help you to understand. The definition of interface is where two systems interact and come together. Let me use your cell phone as an example because it is a computer where you get information from, but if you’re like me then you’ve probably dropped your cell phone before and if you don’t have a cover, you broke your screen. The screen is the interface that the computer is connected to and outputs information for you. If the screen is cracked, then it’s hard to interact with that information and that’s what happens to our souls.
The soul is like the screen on our phone which is an interface that displays to the world what’s in our hearts.
When you are born again all of the power is within your heart, but your soul is still damaged and it is your mind, will and emotions that need repair or restoration. The interface of our soul gets cracked through life’s journey and it can block the flow of the river of God’s grace. It’s the living powerful word of God that can clean, heal and restore our soul’s so that the soul can interface correctly with our spirit which is made in the image of God.
The restoration of the soul allows the flow of God’s grace to be fully displayed to this world. It is through spiritual discipline that our soul is repaired and restored which is the first step towards soul transformation or you could call it character development. Character development is all about letting the Spirit of Go change our hearts. It’s about change from the inside out, but spiritual discipline has to be intentional.
Just like an athlete is intentional in preparing his body for the athletic event in like manner we must daily discipline ourselves. Paul told Timothy that bodily training is of some value, but godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. So, the sacrifice of our bodies is first of all about laying our hearts before the Lord. It’s ceasing from all carnal strivings whether that’s legalism or lawlessness. It’s about surrendering and living the cruciform life. Hebrews 4:11 encourages us to be diligent to enter into the finished work of Christ at the altar of the cross.
The foundation for all of the other sacrifices is the sacrifice of our bodies and we must get that one correct.
The sacrifice of our bodies is about completely identifying with the cross and ceasing from our own works. It’s building on the foundation of repentance from dead works, faith towards God and doctrine of baptisms. Practicing spiritual disciplines is about learning to cooperate with the Spirit’s ways. We learn from the gospels that Jesus undertook spiritual discipline as a fixed pattern of his life and as we follow in the footsteps of our master we should too. As we give attention to the ancient rhythms of Scripture, we quickly discover that anyone who accomplished God’s will for their lives daily put into practice the sacrifice of spiritual disciplines.
Offering up our bodies is the first step, but how do we practically accomplish the task? In scripture you have what is called positional truth and practical application. Here are some examples of positional truth. I Cor. 1:30 says, in Christ we are holy. That’s a positional truth telling us what Christ has done for us. Eph. 1:4 says we have been chosen in Christ to be holy and blameless. Col. 1:22 says by accepting Christ’s death we are holy. I Cor. 1:2 says Christ has made us holy. These are positional truths of what Christ has done for us through his one sacrifice. However, when we are talking about practical holiness there is a practical application.
As believers we must act to apply holiness to our personal lives.
Romans 12:1 tells us that to accomplish this we must present our bodies daily as living sacrifices. It demands action on our part to deny ourselves the right to live our own lives, but subject ourselves as slaves of Christ. It is only through abiding in a relationship with Christ that we are set apart to worship him and do his will.
Just as the priest daily had to go to the bronze laver in fulfilling their duty so we must daily submit to the washing of the word of God.
Ephesians 5:27 tells us that we are practically made holy by the daily intake of the word of God. It is through the renewing of our minds with the positional truth of what God’s word says about us that will give us the power to enter into the practical application and become doers of the word. So, we just went over the difference between positional truth and practical application. The goal is to have the mind of Christ. To think the way he wants us to think so that we can act the way that he wants us to act. So, what does it mean to be earthly minded?
To be earthly minded is to walk according to the course of this world which is simply living our lives by the works of the flesh. Let me remind you what those works are in Galatians 5:19-21: Now the works of the flesh are evident, sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. Paul in Colossians 3:5 tells us to put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. Covetousness which can also be translated as greed is the root of idolatry. Greed refers to an inordinate affection placed upon the object of desire. It can be money, possessions, climbing the ladder of your career or even allowing a person to become more important in your heart than God.
Idolatry has to do with giving excessive amounts of time, money and affection to something that goes way beyond normal limits. It’s not just doing a good job at your career, but it’s letting your career take complete control of your life to where it is the center of all that you do. It’s not just being a good steward over the possessions God has entrusted to you, but it’s putting your possessions at the center of your life where your identity becomes what you possess. Idolatry can take many forms like an obsession for food, sex, religion, money or gambling.
If we live as earthly-minded people, it will bring spiritual death to our lives. Since the body is made of the dust of the earth it has a tendency towards sin, if it is not presented to God. It’s why we must daily offer up our bodies as living sacrifices.
As long as we live in this earthly body we must decide if we are going to be filled with the spirit of the world or the Spirit of God. It is up to us to put on the provision made available to us in Christ and give no room to the sins of the flesh (Romans 13:12). The body is to be a temple of the Holy Spirit. We are not to allow our bodies to be used as instruments of sin, but as instruments of the Holy Spirit. Our bodies are not for sexual sin, anger, drugs, drunkenness or any work of the flesh, but are for the Lord.
How do we live holy lives? As I previously said, the first step to living holy is presenting our bodies as a living sacrifice. The second step is renewing our minds through the word of God. As a holy priesthood we must present our bodies unto God at the altar of the cross and then at the bronze altar we need to allow our minds to be washed, renewed and be filled with the Holy Spirit. This will set our feet on the path of God’s will for our lives bringing us into the plan He has for us. As the priests daily entered into the presence of a Holy Father, they had to wash themselves at the laver.
We must DAILY WASH OUR MINDS WITH THE WORD OF God to cleanse ourselves from the dirt of this world, so we are not conformed to its ways, but transformed into God’s dwelling place. Through this renewing we discover God’s will.
The renewing of our minds will cause us to be a Spirit filled person. It is by the power of the Holy Spirit that we put to death the sinful deeds of the body (Romans 8:13). If we will walk by the power of the Holy Spirit, then we will not carry out the desires of the flesh (Galatians 5:16). Why is there still a struggle with holiness? The struggle with holiness is that we have become new creations in Christ, but we still live in a natural body. The body has not been changed therefore, it must be brought under the power of God.
We live in a sinful worldly system in which Satan is the god (II Corinthians 4:4). His system operates by: The lust of the flesh. The lust of the eyes. The boastful pride of life I John 2:16. Now James poses a question in his epistle. "Do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God." So, let’s ask ourselves how do we become friends with the world? We become the world's friend when we begin to love the world.
The Greek word John uses in I John 2:15 in telling us to not love the world is agapao and it means to set our affection upon something. The Lexical Aids to the New Testament literally says that this word indicates a direction of the will. When we begin to set our affection upon this world more than God, then our pathway is diverted which will begin to affect what we do (our hands), where we go (our feet) and how we view things (our eyes)".
We have become friends of this world and put ourselves in opposition to God because our affections have been captivated. When our priorities have pushed God out of our lives, and we have put other things as the center of our attention it is time to make adjustments.
Jesus gave us a radical word analogy in Matthew chapter 5 telling us to tear out our eyes and cut off our hands if they are causing us to sin. He wasn’t telling us to actually harm ourselves, but to take seriously the effect sin has upon our lives. In a practical way, how do we cut off our hands and feet or pluck out our eyes and throw them away, so that Jesus takes first place in our lives? It is not the physical members of our body, which is the root of our problem, these areas have just become the vehicle or instrument of the lower nature in our lives.
I Peter 2:11 says abstain from fleshly lusts, which wage war against the soul. It’s the same type of terminology that Paul uses in Galatians chapter 5 concerning the works of the lower nature. It’s also the same Greek word eputhumia that Paul uses in Romans chapter 6 showing that there can be no co-existence with fleshly lusts. In Romans 6 where Paul was talking about slavery to sin he said, do not let sin reign in your mortal body that you should obey its lusts, and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness. If Paul was telling us to do something, then he obviously had a solution to the problem. He said that our lives don’t have to be dominated by the lower nature.
We can be free to serve God with our whole heart, but we must bring those areas affected in our souls to the healing power of the cross.
Just as a doctor will not operate on you without your consent, so you must present yourself to God as a willing sacrifice. God's operating tool for dealing with the lower nature is His sharp two-edged sword. Hebrews 4: 12 says that the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit…able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. It is the living word of God that will pierce our hearts and heal our wounds if we humbly receive it.
James 1:21 tells us to receive with humility the word allowing it to be implanted into our hearts which will save our souls. The word implanted is the idea of allowing the word to literally take root in your hearts where it becomes a part of your soul. It is the restorative process of healing and deliverance within your soul. It’s the power of covenant working through you as you learn to abide in Christ your covenant partner.
Our identification in Christ is tied to our covenant relationship with Him.
If you have not listened to Lesson 8: The Cycle of New Life as part of this school of discipleship I encourage you to do that. I John 5:8 speaks of what I refer to as the threefold cord of covenant which is the Spirit, the water and the blood. The blood of the covenant must be applied to our lives, as we totally identify with the cross and follow Him. It is being established in the grace of God and the freedom we have in His unfailing love of forgiveness.
The water speaks of two things which is baptism and daily renewal. Our baptismal identification with Christ is more than going into water one time. Colossians 2:11 says our baptismal identification with Christ is like circumcision, but it’s a circumcision of the heart and sets us free from the 'lower nature'. It is our daily commitment to identify with the cross. We also live, work and play in this world and we will get the dirty residue of the world on us affecting our view of Christ in us.
Like the cover of our phones, the interface of our souls get fingerprints on it. It is soiled with what we’ve been eating and touching throughout our day on it. Our phone screens need to be cleaned daily even after they’ve been repaired. It is for this reason that we must be daily washed off by renewing our souls with the water of the word of God.
The Spirit has come to live within us, changing us from the inside out. Ephesians 3:16 says that we are strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inward man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. The threefold cord of covenant is about partnering with the ability of Christ to bring us into all that He accomplished for us on the cross. Now that does not mean it’s not going to be without struggle. Peter described Satan as a prowling lion lurking and looking for those whom he can devour.
Demons are like vultures who roam around looking for dead flesh to eat.
Jesus in Matthew 11:12 said, "the kingdom of heaven is forcibly entered, and violent men seize it for themselves". What he was saying is that I’m giving you my kingdom, but you have to take hold of it. You have to fight off the works of darkness in this age. The work is finished, but you have to surrender your life as a covenant partner to partake of the Spirit's power. If you are constantly walking in the works of the lower nature, you are literally fighting against the Spirit of Christ within you. It’s where the vultures feed and Satan is able to eat your lunch.
The beauty of the cross is that our greatest weapon is humility and surrender allowing our covenant partner to fight through us.
Covenant is about being joined to the cross through the blood, water and Spirit. It is the mystery of Christ that Paul talked about which is growing daily in the knowledge of Christ in you. The goal of every believer in this age is to learn to allow Christ to dwell within our hearts and grow in the knowledge of that understanding. The blood, water and Spirit are deep wells of eternal life giving us a taste of the age to come in the here and now.
Jesus said the kingdom of God is within you. As the Spirit fills us, we are literally tasting of heaven and our hearts are being transformed by the power of grace from the throne resulting in change from the inside out. All you have to do is surrender to the power of the cross. No one can do it for you.
The greatest counselor is the Holy Spirit, but you have to listen. Right now, if you have an open heart, the Holy Spirit is speaking to you about things He wants to change in you. Just yield to the Spirit and he’ll change you from the inside out. As you surrender to the Spirit the works of the lower nature will lose their grip over your life. You don’t have to be controlled by the lower nature.
Am I saying that we can be sinless? Is it possible to live a life without ever yielding to the lower nature? I believe if we take a balanced view of scripture, then we can say that it is impossible to never yield to the lower nature that is never committing a sin, yet we can live life without the lower nature dominating and controlling our lives. We grow in Christ and it’s a process of allowing the seed of God’s word to mature in us. Always remember that our God is a holy God, but he is also a merciful Father who has compassion on us and knows our frailties.
Just as a tree grows in stages and is perfect in each stage so it is with our walk in Christ.
Romans 12:2 tells us not to be conformed to this world, but to be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. The will of God matures in stages as we learn to yield our lives and stay planted in the word of God. The more you learn to yield to the Spirit of life then day by day you will find yourself living freely in the presence of the Father. If we find ourselves overcome by the lower nature, then the only way to get free is repentance. Repentance is simply responding to the Holy Spirit's loving conviction which draws us back to the Father.
The Holy Spirit will remind us of the work of Christ on the cross and the commitment we have made to Him. Repentance is renewing our covenant relationship with God.
I John 1:9 says that "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." Repentance does not change God's love for us, because He never stopped loving us. It changes our direction from a life entangled in the lower nature back to the foundation of God's love and forgiveness.
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Next Lesson: Lesson 25 - Part I The Sacrifice of Praise
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