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Hebrews 9:13-14
For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Messiah, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God. Unlike all the other offerings, which are performed by the altar of the Temple, the offering of the red heifer is to be done outside the Temple. This alludes to Yeshua who was also 'offered' outside the Temple. In the second half of the first century C.E., the Sadducee leadership executed James the Righteous, the brother of the Master and leader of the Israeli community of believers. This event initiated a severe persecution of the Israeli believers in the Rabbi from Nazareth. As the Master had prophesied, the disciples became outlawed in the Synagogues and in the Temple where they had until then worshipped side by side with other Jews (Luke 21:12; John 16:2). They also faced official excommunication from the rest of the Jewish community. At that time the writer of the Letter to the Hebrews' community in disarray desperately tries to encourage Yeshua's disciples. As they lost their rights to attendance in the Temple below along with representation by its earthly High Priest, the author encourages the Nazarenes to look to the Temple and High Priesthood which are above. He contrasts the offerings below, which serve to purify the flesh for attendance at the earthly Temple, with the offering of Yeshua whose blood could clean their conscience for attendance at the heavenly Temple: the throne of the Almighty, all through representation by a heavenly High Priesthood (Hebrews 9:13-14; 4:16). In this light, their loss seemed like a gain! Today Jewish Messianic believers still face excommunication from Jewish orthodoxy at large. Some very small but very vocal orthodox minority even actively works to deny present-day Jewish believers their emigration rights to the Land or to its social benefits. It is important to mention here that it is from such a circle that Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles came from. Abba does seem to have a sense of humour! In the same manner as the first century believers did, we the Jewish believers of today must also allow our eyes to, for a moment, forego the temporal realities below and embrace the eternal realities above. We must also, as the Master taught us, respond to evil with good (Isaiah 53:7; Romans 12:21). Because we are sure of our rights, commission, and destiny, we know that we can, and should 'stand' firm for who we are, even while turning the other cheek (Matthew 5:39; Ephesians 6:13-14). We absolutely must refuse to ourselves the indulging temptation to answer evil with anger and hatred. Even so, as the red heifer offered outside the Temple, let us go to him (Yeshua) outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured (Hebrews 13:13). As offered first-borns of the congregation of the First-Born (Revelations 7:4; 14:4; Hebrews 12:23), let us follow Him and be offered as He was, excommunicated, outside the temple, and allow the Father to work through us His plan of universal redemption to the Jew first, then to the Gentiles (Romans 1:16).
1 Comment
1 Corinthians 15:46
But it is not the spiritual that is first but the natural, and then the spiritual. We are told about the person who sprinkles the red heifer water for purification, And it shall be a statute forever for them. The one who sprinkles the water for impurity shall wash his clothes, and the one who touches the water for impurity shall be unclean until evening(Numbers 19:21). In other words, the one who purifies others defiles himself in doing so. Blood is ritually unclean and the red heifer water is blood based. Therefore he that even touches that water is made impure by it but yet, while it is unclean, it purifies others, and while he who touches it defiles himself, he purifies others. How can an impure element purify? It may seem like a contradiction but is it really? To what can it be compared? When I clean my house I usually get dirty and I have to wash myself afterword; even the washing agents that I use are dangerous to me. When I do dishes (the old fashioned way) I put my hands in dirty dishwater to scrub plates and silverware then rinse the dishes clean onto a dish drainer. I dirty my hands to clean a dish. While this seems to be a contradiction, it is very consistent with the principles of God’s Kingdom. It is impossible for one to ascend unless he first was down, or descended from above. Before being first, we must hold the inferior position. Also in the same manner, serving precedes leading; lowliness comes before exaltation and poverty before wealth. The carnal is before before the spiritual, the corruptible before the eternal. Adam was the first, Yeshua the last, but in the end, the first becomes last and the last becomes first! Please Abba, may He who was first and made Himself last to take us back as firsts with Him return soon to establish a first-class kingdom on earth in these last days. 2Timothy 2:15
Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. The Apostolic Scriptures join in the Hebrew text with the idea of purification by the waters of the red heifer. People came early to Jerusalem for the Passover in order to purify themselves (John 11:55), It is noted that Paul himself, after a long trip out of the Land purified himself in that manner along with four other believers from the Messianic congregation in Jerusalem. He even paid for the expense, which required the offering of animals (Acts 21:24, 26). Believers usually assume that Yeshua’s death on the cross replaced any and all form of offering, but there are no Scriptural grounds for that. The book of Acts (as well as other historical literature) tells us that the disciples continued attending the Jerusalem Temple’s regular morning and evening prayers which involved offerings (Acts 3:1), that they actually constantly hanged around the Temple (Acts 2:46). Records even show us that many of the priests were believers (Acts 6:7) and that believers were in control of the city (Acts 5:26; Acts 6:7).The only reason the believers stopped attending the Temple’s prayers and services was because of persecution. A few years before the Roman invasion an evil High-Priest martyred James the Just (the leader of the Hebrew believers and brother of Yeshua) and as a result as Yeshua predicted it, the believers were kicked out of the synagogues and of the Temple (John 16:2) which was eventually destroyed in 70 C.E. by the Roman General Titus. The book of Hebrew attests to the need of the red heifer‘s water purification in these words, For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Messiah, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God (Hebrews 9:13-14). Our author here validates the efficaciousness of the blood of Messiah to purify our conscience with the efficaciousness the waters of a red heifer to sanctify the flesh in order to enter Jerusalem and the Temple. The argument here is invalidated if the purification through the water of the red heifer has become obsolete. Offerings were never intended for the sanctification of the conscience; only for the flesh. Only God through the Messiah cleans the conscience and since the work of Messiah was completed before the foundation of the earth along with all the works of God, this principle has at work through people being justified even in the times that precede Yeshua’s manifestation on earth (Genesis 15:6; 1:Peter 1:20; John 14:6). May Messiah daily clean our soul form sin, iniquity and unrighteousness, but mostly from teachings that tend to invalidate and re-interpret the Word in a way He never intended it to be. 2 Corinthians 5:21
For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. The Hebrew Scriptures tell us about the laws of the red heifer, the laws that provide ritual purification to those who have been contaminated by contact with a carcass of some sort (Numbers 19). These laws have a problem in themselves. The priest who slaughters the red heifer becomes himself ritually unclean, therefore unable to continue to perform the ritual unless he has by him remaining red heifer solution. After 2, 000 years of Diaspora we do not have any of that solution, so even if the Temple was rebuilt today, it would not be able to operate because along with the priesthood, it needs to be purified with the ashes of a red heifer. Whereas we may not fully understand the reasons for these laws, we must always remember that the psalmist said that the Law of God is perfect, pure and right altogether (Psalms 19: 7-8), so whether we can figure it in our own mind or not, whatever it teaches is right and beneficial for us. Here is something we can glean from the mystical rulings concerning the red heifer. Priests usually tried to avoid the state of ritual uncleanliness. In the days of the Master they had become obsessed by it. That is why the priest did not want to help the dying man on the road to Jericho (Luke 10:30-36). It is also why people could not conceive that a holy man like Yeshua would agree to go to the house of Matthew or even Zaccheus who, while being Jewish were people unparticular of these things. Because pagans often buried their dead in the walls or under their house, Rabbis declared it a sin to enter the house of a non-Jew. That is why Peter had to be given permission by Yeshua himself to go to Cornelius’ house (Acts 10). sexual relations provoked that same type of uncleanliness, so Moses who was to be ready to enter in the presence of God at any time forewent having sexual relations with his wife which caused those who did not understand the full scope of his actions to murmur against him (Numbers 12:1). Contrary to that attitude in the laws of the red heifer, just like in the procedures of Yom Kippur, the priest voluntarily made himself unclean by the slaughtering of the chosen animal, and this teaches us a great lesson. Yeshua also went contrary to the idea of ritual cleanliness held by the priests of His days. Instead of avoiding uncleanliness, He went right into it. Just like the priest performing the ritual slaughter voluntarily became unclean for the sake of purifying Israel Yeshua voluntarily put on the sinful cloak of humanity, became unclean for our sake so He could provide us with the cleansing needed to return us unto God. As we try to keep ourselves ‘clean’ from the world and its ‘death’, we should always remember that spiritual cleanliness is not an end in itself but a means to an end, and the end is service to our brothers and sisters, to those who have seen the light, but all the more to those who have not. Like Peter, the Master tells us to not be afraid to enter the house of the ungodly and bring him the message of God’s words. |
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