Posted by R. Fowler White
The Typological Significance of Israel:
Hebrews 3-12
I. Doubtless the clearest example of how God’s covenants testify to Christ is Moses, Israel, and the old covenant. In summary, God fashioned Moses and Israel as a shadow and type of Christ and the church (1 Cor 10:1-11; Heb 3:1-6; 8:1-6; 10:1). According to Heb 3:1-6, God has one house (not two or more) in history, and that one house was once in the care of Moses the servant of God, but now is in the care of Jesus the Son of God. Hebrews also tells us that Moses was a testimony of the things to come in Christ. Later, in Heb 7–10, we’re told that the entire old covenant arrangement—from its covenant to its sanctuary, to its priests, to its sacrifices—was a shadow and type of the new covenant arrangement with its sanctuary, priest, and sacrifice. The following points will allow us to elaborate on this summary.
II. Periodization of history—The author of Hebrew divides history into two periods: the time before reformation and the time of reformation, 9:10. He also divides history into the time before the last days and the time of the last days, 1:1-2. In the context of his epistle, the time before reformation (i.e., before the last days) is the time of the old covenant; the time of reformation (i.e., of the last days) is the time of the new covenant.
A. God’s house: Israel and the church are presented as two covenantal administrations of one and the same house of God. Jesus the faithful Son over God’s house is greater than Moses the faithful servant in God’s house, 3:1-6.
B. God’s promise and warning: Israel and the church are the one house of God to whom He addresses His promise of rest and His warning against wrath. God’s people under Moses forfeited the promise of God’s rest preached to them, 3:7-19. We’re to heed, therefore, the warning in Ps 95: don’t be like the exodus generation, 3:7-11. The promise of rest and the warning of wrath still apply, 3:12-19. God’s people under Jesus have had God’s promise of rest reaffirmed to us, 4:1-13. Therefore, we’re to respond in faith to the promise of rest (in the New Canaan-earth), 4:1-2. The promise of God’s rest, issued at creation and reissued by David after Joshua, remains, 4:3-10. Therefore, we should remain diligent to enter the rest God still promises in the New Canaan-earth, 4:11-13.
III. The Levites’ priesthood, covenant, sanctuary, sacrifices, and ministry were all copies, types, and shadows of Jesus’ Melchizedekal priesthood, covenant, sanctuary, sacrifice, and ministry; the antitypical reality is better than the types, Heb 7:1–10:18.
Key: As God moves His house through the history of His revelation and redemption, He shifts our attention from earthly, temporary copies and shadows (pictures, models, patterns, types) of heavenly, eternal realities (archetypes, antitypes) to the heavenly, eternal realities themselves. The shadows are not simply replaced by the realities; they are fulfilled in them. The earthly was patterned after the heavenly. That is, the heavenly was the pattern for the earthly. The temporary was changeable and transitory; it pointed above and ahead to the unchangeable and permanent.
A. Jesus the Melchizedekal priest has replaced the Levitical priests, 7:1-28. As we should have anticipated from Ps 110 and Gen 14, the Levitical priesthood was not permanent. Melchizedek’s powerful and effective priestly order preceded (Gen 14) and has now replaced Levi’s weak and ineffective priestly order. Melchizedek was greater than Abraham, the father of Levi, 7:1-10. Melchizedek’s priestly order has therefore replaced Levi’s priestly order: Melchizedek’s order is a priesthood ministering with God’s oath; it has replaced a priesthood ministering without God’s oath, 7:11-28.
B. The new, better covenant has been enacted; the old covenant is now obsolete, 8:1-13. (Note: the old covenant was temporary, provisional, 9:8-10.)—Jesus is now ministering as a high priest in the heavenly sanctuary, 8:1-3. He cannot minister as a priest on earth, 8:4-5. He has obtained a better, heavenly ministry than the earthly ministry of the Levites, 8:6.—The new covenant is better than the old covenant, 8:7-13. The introduction of a second covenant shows that the first is “faulty,” 8:7. The new covenant is not like the old, in which the people did not continue, 8:8-9. The new covenant creates a new people, 8:10-12. The announcement of the new covenant shows that the old was to come to an end, 8:13.
C. The old sanctuary, sacrifices, and service were not fully and finally powerful to purify, 9:1-10. The old sanctuary—the tabernacle—was prepared, 9:1-5, and the old sacrificial ministry (liturgy) was performed, 9:6-10, to show that before Christ there was no direct access to God.
D. The new sanctuary, sacrifice, and ministry are fully and finally powerful to purify, 9:11-28. The new sacrifice and ministry of Christ our High Priest are powerful to purify, 9:11-14. The new sacrifice of Christ was necessary to put the new covenant into effect, 9:15-28.
E. The new sacrifice is fully and finally powerful to purify; the old sacrifices were not, 10:1-18. The Law’s sacrifices were powerless to purify sinners to meet God, 10:1-4. Christ’s sacrifice has replaced the sacrifices made according to the Law, 10:5-10. The finished work of Christ has superseded the endless work of the Levites, 10:11-14. As Jeremiah’s new covenant prophecy told us, “forgiveness granted” means “sacrifice has ceased,” 10:15-18.
Eschatology Outlines: No. 7A How Rev 19:11-21 Relates to Rev 20:1ff.