ference is not
great.

But the Teacher has not yet done with the wealth of the Mosaic types of
our full salvation. He has more to say about the profound truth that the
New Covenant needed for its Mediator, its Herald, its Guarantor and
Conveyer of blessing, not a Moses but a Messiah, who could both die and
reign, could at once be Sacrifice and Priest. Covenants, in the normal
order of God's will in Scripture, demanded death for their ratification.
"Where covenant is, there must be brought in the death of the
covenant-victim."[J] So it was with the old covenant (verses 18-21) in
the narrative of Exodus xxiv. So, throughout the Mosaic rules, we find
"remission," practically always, conditioned by "blood-shedding" (ver.
22). Peace with violated holiness was to be attained only by means of
sacrificial death. The terrestrial sanctuary, viewed as polluted by the
transgressions of the worshippers who sought its benefits, required
sacrificial death, the blood of bulls and goats, so to "cleanse" it that
God could meet Israel there in peace (ver. 23). Even so, only after a
higher and holier order, must it be with the better covenant and that
invisible sanctuary where a reconciled God may for ever meet in peace
His spiritual Israel. There must be priestly immolation and an offered
sacrifice; there must be peace conditioned by life-blood shed. And such
is the work of our Messiah-Priest. He has "borne the sins of many" (ver.
28). Presenting Himself (ver. 6) as the Atonement Victim, in the
heavenly Holiest, He has thereby "borne," uplifted ([Greek:
anenenkein]), in that Presence, for pardon and peace, the sins of the
new Israel. And so "the heavenly things" are, relatively to that Israel,
"cleansed"; their God can meet them in that sanctuary with an intimacy
and access free and perfect, because their High Priest and Mediator has
done His work for them. For ever and ever now they need no new
_sacrifice_; His blood, once shed, is eternally sufficient. Aye, and
they need now for ever no repeated _offering_ (ver. 25) of sacrifice, no
new _presentation_ of His blood before the throne, since once He has
taken His place upon it. To offer again He must suffer again (ver. 26).
For it is the law of His office first to offer--_and then to take His
place at the right hand_. He must leave that place, He must descend
again to a cross, if He is to take again the attitude of presentation.
"Henceforth" He sits, "expecting" (see below, x. 13), "till H