A Translation Question

"Now the God of peace, that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, Make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is wellpleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ; to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen." — Hebrews 13:20, 21 King James Version.


QUESTION: Is it perfectly permissible in Heb. 13:20, 21, to so translate the Greek and punctuate it that the meaning will be that the clause "by the blood of the everlasting covenant" modifies "make you perfect," instead of "brought again from the dead"?

ANSWER: The erroneous order of clauses in the Authorized [King James] Version has suggested this question. The order in the Revision is that of the Greek, "Now the God of peace, who brought again from the dead the great shepherd of the sheep with the blood of the everlasting covenant, even our Lord Jesus Christ, make you perfect," etc. Hence the suggested change would shock any Greek scholar.

— From Steele's Answers p. 16.

The Spiritual Import of the Levitical Sacrifices.

 We must not conclude our introductory remarks [to the book of Leviticus] without calling attention to the vital point — the central idea of the book — its spiritual meaning.

That so elaborate a ritual looked beyond itself we cannot doubt. It was a prophecy of things to come; a shadow whereof the substance was Christ and his kingdom. We may not always be able to say what the exact relation is between the type and the antitype. Of many things we may be sure that they belonged only to the nation to whom they were given, containing no prophetic significance, but serving as witnesses and signs to them of God’s covenant of grace. We may hesitate to pronounce with Jerome, that ‘every sacrifice, nay, almost every syllable — the garments of Aaron and the whole Levitical system — breathe of heavenly mysteries;’ but we cannot read the Epistle to the Hebrews and not acknowledge that the Levitical priests ‘served the pattern and type of heavenly things’ — that the sacrifices of the law pointed to and found their interpretation in the LAMB OF GOD — that the ordinances of outward purification signified the truer inward cleansing of the heart and conscience from dead works, to serve the living God.

One idea, moreover, penetrates the whole of this vast and burdensome ceremonial, and gives it a real glory, even apart from any prophetic significance. HOLINESS is its end. Holiness is its character. The tabernacle is holy — the vessels are holy — the offerings are most holy unto Jehovah — the garments of the priests are holy. All who approach Him whose name is ‘Holy,’ whether priests who minister to him or people who worship before him, must themselves be holy. It would seem as if, amid the camp and dwellings of Israel, was ever to be heard an echo of that solemn strain which fills the courts above, where the seraphim cry one to another, HOLY, HOLY, HOLY. — Perowne.

Conscience and the Work of Sanctification

It is interesting and instructive to note the relation of the Holy Spirit to conscience in the work of regeneration and sanctification. If man was created to be a temple of God, his spirit must be the holy of holies in which He dwells, and his conscience must be the Ark of the Covenant which carries His law. Sin defiled that sacred ark and rendered it offensive to the holy God. The scheme of redemption must have direct reference to the purification of the conscience. The writer to the Hebrews intimates that Mosaism "did not make him that did the service perfect, as pertaining to the conscience" ix. 9), and he exhorts the believer to "draw near, having his heart sprinkled from an evil (guilty) conscience" (x. 22). The conscience, relieved of guilt through faith in the atonement made by Christ, and ever after prompting to a life of obedience, is the spiritual organ in which the Holy Spirit evermore dwells, keeping watchful guard over the living law in the heart and constantly witnessing to the persevering believer that he is a child of God. Peace, the fruit of the Spirit, can dwell only with a "conscience void of offence." Holiness, the work of the Spirit, is also attested by conscience. "For our glorying is this, the testimony of our conscience that in holiness we behaved ourselves," etc. (II Corinthians i. 12, Revised Version).

— from The Gospel of the Comforter Chapter 19.

In What Sense Was Jesus Tempted?

QUESTION: If, as one writer puts it, there was no tinder in Christ for the devil to strike fire into, then in what sense was he tempted in all points, as we are?

ANSWER: Like us he was free to stand or to fall, otherwise his obedience was necessary, mechanical and no more praiseworthy than a good clock is for being an accurate timekeeper. None but a free agent can be an example for a free agent. Yet there was in the divine mind a perfect certainty that Jesus would resist temptation foreseen by infinite wisdom and foreknowledge. There are two kinds of sins, one of the flesh — sins finding expression through the body, and sins of the spirit, which are mental and independent of the body, such as pride, selfishness, unbelief, malice, etc. In respect to both of these classes Jesus was tempted beginning with the selfish use of his supernaturalism to satisfy his hunger, and ending with the suggestion to avoid the cross and become king immediately by a stroke of state. The fact that there was in him no hereditary bent toward sin makes a seeming difference between him and us. But it may be that the influence of the Holy Spirit more than compensates us. Jesus stood alone as a man assaulted by Satan unaided by his own personal divinity, and by the Holy Pentecostal Spirit, who was not yet given. Delitzsch insists that the words "without sin" limits the phrase, "in all points like as we are," except an innate proneness to be led astray. In so doing the writer of this epistle "brings out more clearly the unlimited similarity in all other respects." The tempter found him without sin and left him sinless. 

— Steele's Answers, pp. 226, 227.

On Hebrews 9:28

QUESTION: Please explain Heb. 9:28, showing who the waiting; persons are and what is the salvation waited for: "so Christ also, having been once offered to bear the sins of many, shall appear a second time, apart from sin, to them that wait for him unto salvation."

ANSWER: The Jewish high priest had to make his offering again and again (verses 6, 7, 25), but the superior efficacy of Christ's offering is proven by the fact that it was made once-for-all (one word in Greek); after which he pleads in heaven for us presenting his offering, and securing the constant three-fold offices of the Paraclete (John 16:7-11) till his second appearing to raise the dead, to judge mankind, and to glorify believers, dead and living, who are in expectancy of this completion of their eternal salvation, soul and body wearing the glorious image of Christ. Says Bishop Ellicott, on Phil. 3:20, 21, "It seems wholly unnecessary to restrict this merely to the living," since every moment the true Christian in this world and in the interval between death and the resurrection is waiting in joyful expectation of this glorious consummation. That professed disciple of Christ who is not expecting with strong desire "the fashioning anew of the body of his humiliation, to be conformed to Christ's glorified body," is a false disciple. This text cannot be legitimately used in proof of the conversion of sinners at or after Christ's future advent. Such a doctrine is nowhere taught in the New Testament.

— Steele's Answers p. 225, 226.

Is It Impossible to Restore Fallen Believers?

QUESTION: Explain the impossibility of renewing fallen believers, as stated in (1) Heb. 6:4-6 and (2) 10:26, 27.

ANSWER: The Hebrew Christian who apostatized to find favor with his Jewish kindred must abandon not only the practice of Christianity, but the theory also. Before restoration to the synagogue he must declare Jesus an accursed impostor, a malefactor, "a hanged man." So long as he is doing this he is crucifying the Son of God afresh, in the present tense, denoting continuousness, it is impossible for God, who respects free agency, to save him. In (2) the sinning willfully is another present tense. So long as willful sin continues the apostate can find in Judaism no effectual sacrifice, but, if he should turn to Christ, he will find that his sacrifice has not lost its virtue. So long as any man is abiding in a state of willing sin he is shutting the door of repentance behind him. God does not shut that door, the sinner shuts it himself, and he alone can open it. He is the first cause, the cause uncaused of all his moral acts. He is the creator of his own character and destiny.

— Steele's Answers p. 147, 148.

Can a Sinner Be Restored?

QUESTION: I am in great distress, having been pardoned and baptized with the Holy Spirit, a happy, aggressive Christian worker, then knowingly and deliberately committing sin and repeating it for months and years. Is it possible for me again to find acceptance with adoption into the family of God? do you think there is any hope for so great a sinner?

ANSWER: Your case is a very sad one, but I see one ray of hope. Your desire to be restored to the state from which you have fallen is an indication that the Holy Spirit has not left you. He who commits the irremissible sin has, we are told no longing for restoration. Hebrews 6:4-8 may be quoted against our position, but this text does not apply to you because you are "not crucifying (present tense) the Son of God afresh," but rather, earnestly seeking him as your Saviour. Hebrews 10:26-31 has also a present tense denoting a persistent sinning: "For if we are willingly sinning," etc.: It should also be borne in mind that the apostasy of a Christian Hebrew is the rejection of the Christian system and a return to Judaism, in which such an apostate will find no effectual sacrifice for sin. But should he return to Christ he will not cast him out.

"There's a wideness in his mercy

Like the wideness of the sea."

The adversary, the devil, often tempts backsliders to believe that they have committed the unpardonable sin. In my pastoral experience by quoting the divine promises to a dying sailor who said, "There is no mercy for me, I have broken all of God's laws," his despair was changed into faith in Christ. He found pardon and died in peace. My advice to this sorrowing inquirer is to go to Jesus saying, "If I perish I will pray and perish only there."

— Steele's Answers pp. 26-28.