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  • Hebrews 8

    Meeting tents, sacrifices, and covenants

    Now the main point of what we are saying is this: We have this kind of high priest. He sat down at the right side of the throne of the majesty in the heavens. He’s serving as a priest in the holy place, which is the true meeting tent that God, not any human being, set up. Every high priest is appointed to offer gifts and sacrifices. So it’s necessary for this high priest also to have something to offer. If he was located on earth, he wouldn’t be a priest because there are already others who offer gifts based on the Law. They serve in a place that is a copy and shadow of the heavenly meeting tent. This is indicated when Moses was warned by God when he was about to set up the meeting tent: See that you follow the pattern that I showed you on the mountain in every detail. But now, Jesus has received a superior priestly service just as he arranged a better covenant that is enacted with better promises.

    If the first covenant had been without fault, it wouldn’t have made sense to expect a second. But God did find fault with them, since he says,

    Look, the days are coming, says the Lord,
            when I will make a covenant with the house of Israel,
            and I will make a new covenant with the house of Judah.
    It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors
        on the day I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt,
            because they did not continue to keep my covenant,
            and I lost interest in them, says the Lord.
    10 This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel
            after those days, says the Lord.
    I will place my laws in their minds,
            and write them on their hearts.
    I will be their God,
        and they will be my people.
    11     And each person won’t ever teach a neighbor
        or their brother or sister, saying,Know the Lord,
            because they will all know me,
                from the least important of them to the most important;
    12         because I will be lenient toward their unjust actions,
                and I won’t remember their sins anymore.

    13 When it says new, it makes the first obsolete. And if something is old and outdated, it’s close to disappearing.