Hebrews 12:18-29; Titus 2:11-15; 1 Corinthians 3:10-16
By standing I mean the position the grace of God puts us in. By state, the moral condition the believer is actually in. Our standing in grace is perfect. Our state is, alas, generally far short of what it should be. The Spirit of God constantly strives to bring us into a condition that will correspond with our standing.
It is ever God’s way. He gives us the standing before He calls for a state to correspond. We are never asked to work up to a position. The position is given to us, in grace; once given, never recalled, and then we are asked to answer to it.
Our first Scripture tells us what we, believers, are not come to. “The mount that might be touched” is Sinai, where the law was given, attended by awesome sights and sounds that made the very mediator, Moses, “exceedingly fear and quake.” The law is demand. Nothing is ministered by the law in the way of support or ability to answer its demands. The law only proved what man was. Rightly understood, all it could do was to shut our mouth, and bring us in guilty before God. Thank God, we have not come to that mount, though the lessons taught there are salutary.
But we are told what we have come to, even to Mount Zion. Isaiah 35:10 gives an idea of what Zion means. We read, “And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads, they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall cease.” It is the place of grace. It connects with redemption and joy and gladness. Sorrow and sighing ceasing tells of the unalloyed bliss that grace will bring us to.
What is grace? I have never yet heard an adequate definition, and never expect to! For grace is the way God acts in showing His favour to sinners, who do not deserve it in the smallest degree. Grace is the way God acts, not as measuring and meeting our need as sinners, but who with lavish hand blesses us according to what He is in His very nature.
An illustration will help us to understand this. It is said of Alexander the Great, that a beggar besought alms from him on one occasion. The Emperor threw him a handful of golden coins. A courtier, astonished at such generosity, ventured to say, “Sire, copper coins would meet the beggar’s need. Why give him golden coins?” Alexander replied in true royal fashion, “Copper coins would suit the beggar’s needs; golden coins suit Alexander’s giving.” Yes; and what suits God’s giving? We must get to know how great He is, His nature, love, and we may get a little idea of what grace means.
“Ye are come to Mount Zion.” Now we climb mountains, and we may well climb this mountain, going up one side, as it were, and descending the other. The items enumerated in verses 22-24 of Hebrews 12 are marked off by the conjunction “and.”
MOUNT ZION
1. “The city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem.”
2. “An innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly.”
3. “Church of the firstborn (ones), which are written in heaven.”
4. “God, the Judge of all.”
5. “The spirits of just men made perfect.”
6. “Jesus, the Mediator of the new covenant.”
7. “The blood of sprinkling, that speaks better things than that of Abel.”
First we have the church, seen in her administrative capacity under the figure of a city. It is Jerusalem above, free, not in bondage, the mother of us all (Gal. 4:26). What grace to link us up with that which is nearest to the heart of Christ. How often we look at things from a merely individualistic point of view, from the village pump standard, instead of being linked up in our minds with the whole church of God upon earth, a member of Christ, to display Him in our place and measure, as fitting in with the whole scheme of display of His grace.
Second, we know little of the place angels play in this matter. We have glimpses of it here and there in the Scriptures. It is here called, an innumerable company of angels. Psalm 68:17 tells us, “The chariots of God are twenty thousand; even thousands of angels; Jehovah is among them, as in Sinai, in the holy place.” We remember how “a multitude of the heavenly host” filled the lower heavens and over “the Babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger” sang their paean of exultation, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men” (Luke 2:13-14).
We have a glance at their unknown, unnoticed, constant ministrations to God’s people, when we read, “Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them, who shall be heirs of salvation?” (Heb. 1:14).
This leads us to the church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven. This is the church seen as the fruit of God’s counsel, “the fulness of Him that fills all in all” (Eph. 1:23), the church that the Lord will “present … to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing holy and without blemish” (Eph. 5:27). What boundless grace, far, far beyond our need, is this, “the counsel of His own will” (Eph. 1:11), “according to the good pleasure of His will” (Eph. 1:5).
We step still higher. What or who is at the top of this mighty mountain of grace, this more than spiritual Mount Everest? Are we able to reach the top? Mount Everest has defied the most strenuous and earnest efforts to put foot on its mighty crest. Can we scale this mighty mountain of grace? Who or what is at the top? Surely, God Himself. He is the One from whom all blessing descends. The gospel is designed to bring us to God. “God, the judge of all;” Judge in the sense of the One, who appoints and apportions to each his place. God is the Judge as witness the Great White Throne, but He is also the Judge, the One who decides for each the place and portion in this scheme of grace. We cannot think of God on Mount Zion as exclusively the One who will exercise a judicial prerogative in apportioning judgment. No, here we are on Mount Zion, grace, grace is our theme. “He shall bring forth the headstone thereof with shoutings, crying, Grace, grace to it” (Zech. 4:7).
We begin to descend the mountain now. We come first “to the spirits of just men made perfect.” The last verse of the previous chapter throws light upon this. “God having provided some better thing for us [believers in this dispensation] that they [believers in old Testament times] without us should not be made perfect (Heb. 11:40). That is to say the Old Testament believers have to wait till the end of the Christian dispensation for full blessing. They will share in the resurrection of those “that are Christ’s at His coming” (1 Cor. 15:23). Their spirits will be made perfect; full blessing according to the place “the Judge of all” apportions them will be theirs.
We next come to Jesus, the Mediator of the new covenant. Moses, the mediator of the law, said at its inauguration, “I exceedingly fear and quake.” And well he might. Jesus will administer the new covenant—the covenant of grace, the covenant of unalloyed blessing, which will be publicly ratified with Israel in a future day, but which blessings are ours even now, even the new birth, the forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Spirit. For its public ratification with Israel in the coming day read Jeremiah 31:31-34 and Ezekiel 36:21-28.
Lastly we come to the blood of sprinkling speaking better things than that of Abel. The blood of the firstling of the flock offered by Abel was only a shadow. Christ’s blood is the substance. One was typical, the other anti-typical. One without real efficacy, the other efficacious.
It cannot here refer to Abel’s own blood being shed, for that only called for vengeance. It spoke of nothing good. But the blood of Abel’s sacrifice was good in its typical meaning, but how infinitely better is that of which it speaks, even the precious blood of Christ, making full atonement, settling every question of righteousness, setting God free to minister grace, pure grace. Thus we have a magnificent mountain of grace. God at the top and the blood of Jesus at the bottom, the firm foundation.
But the chapter runs on to warn us not to neglect the voice of Him that speaks from heaven. If there was no escape for the one, who refused the voice of him who spoke on earth, Moses the giver of the law, it is far more serious to refuse Him who speaks from heaven. God is going to shake everything. That will reveal what can be shaken, which will be cast aside, and reveal that which cannot be shaken that it may abide. How solemn this is!
We have come to Mount Zion—grace, covenant grace, blessing we cannot lose in the mercy of God. But what of our lives? There is the judgment seat of Christ to be faced. There is God’s government to meet. We shall only find relief in the coming day when the wood, hay and stubble are burned up, when all that is not of the Spirit of God shall be consumed. We know how the clearing out of the accumulation of rubbish in homes is a positive relief.
Thank God that “gold, silver, precious stones,” which will stand the test of the fire, God’s discriminating judgment, abides. Doubtless Hebrews 12:25-29 speaks of that which is universal in a coming day, but we do well to apply it to ourselves in our individual life, for the grace of God positively teaches us that “denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously and godly in this present world” (Titus 2:12).
We may well remember, ever keep in mind, that “Our God is a consuming fire,” words written to professing Christians. If we are right minded we shall welcome this, for our God only consumes that which He cannot approve, that which is of the flesh. It is a mercy that is so, for it is in this way our standing and state are brought into accord fully, and “sorrow and sighing will cease for ever.”