forever holy and blessed before
God. This is the substance of the text. Now that we shall find it easy
to understand, we will briefly consider it.

"But Christ having come a high priest of the good things to come."

7. The adornment of Aaron and his descendants, the high priests, was
of a material nature, and they obtained for the people a merely formal
remission of sins, performing their office in a perishable temple, or
tabernacle. It was evident to men that their absolution and
sanctification before the congregation was a temporal blessing
confined to the present. But when Christ came upon the cross no one
beheld him as he went before God in the Holy Spirit, adorned with
every grace and virtue, a true High Priest. The blessings wrought by
him are not temporal--a merely formal pardon--but the "blessings to
come"; namely, blessings which are spiritual and eternal. Paul speaks
of them as blessings to come, not that we are to await the life to
come before we can have forgiveness and all the blessings of divine
grace, but because now we possess them only in faith. They are as yet
hidden, to be revealed in the future life. Again, the blessings we
have in Christ were, from the standpoint of the Old Testament
priesthood, blessings to come.

"Through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands,
that is to say, not of this creation."

8. The apostle does not name the tabernacle he mentions; nor can he,
so strange its nature! It exists only in the sight of God, and is ours
in faith, to be revealed hereafter. It is not made with hands, like
the Jewish tabernacle; in other words, not of "this building." The old
tabernacle, like all buildings of its nature, necessarily was made of
wood and other temporal materials created by God. God says in Isaiah
66, 1-2: "What manner of house will ye build unto me?... For all these
things hath my hand made, and so all these things came to be." But
that greater tabernacle has not yet form; it is not yet finished. God
is building it and he shall reveal it. Christ's words are (Jn 14, 3),
"And if I go and prepare a place for you."

"Nor yet through the blood of goats and calves, but through his own
blood, entered in once for all into the holy place, having obtained
eternal redemption."

9. According to Leviticus 16, the high priest must once a year enter
into the holy place with the blood of rams and other offerings, and
with these make formal reconciliation for the people.