To Be Determined

Uncategorized Scripture

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Having been made perfect, he became to all of those who obey him the author of eternal salvation,

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named by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek.

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About him we have many words to say, and hard to interpret, seeing you have become dull of hearing.

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For although by this time you should be teachers, you again need to have someone teach you the rudiments of the first principles of the oracles of God. You have come to need milk, and not solid food.

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For everyone who lives on milk is not experienced in the word of righteousness, for he is a baby.

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But solid food is for those who are full grown, who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern good and evil.

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Therefore leaving the teaching of the first principles of Christ, let us press on to perfection–not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works, of faith toward God,

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of the teaching of baptisms, of laying on of hands, of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment.

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This will we do, if God permits.

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For concerning those who were once enlightened and tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Spirit,

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and tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the age to come,

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and then fell away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance; seeing they crucify the Son of God for themselves again, and put him to open shame.

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For the land which has drunk the rain that comes often on it, and brings forth a crop suitable for them for whose sake it is also tilled, receives blessing from God;

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but if it bears thorns and thistles, it is rejected and near being cursed, whose end is to be burned.

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But, beloved, we are persuaded of better things for you, and things that accompany salvation, even though we speak like this.

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For God is not unrighteous, so as to forget your work and the labor of love which you showed toward his name, in that you served the saints, and still do serve them.

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We desire that each one of you may show the same diligence to the fullness of hope even to the end,

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that you won’t be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherited the promises.

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For when God made a promise to Abraham, since he could swear by none greater, he swore by himself,

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saying, “Surely blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply you.”

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Thus, having patiently endured, he obtained the promise.

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For men indeed swear by a greater one, and in every dispute of theirs the oath is final for confirmation.

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In this way God, being determined to show more abundantly to the heirs of the promise the immutability of his counsel, interposed with an oath;

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that by two immutable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we may have a strong encouragement, who have fled for refuge to take hold of the hope set before us.

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This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and entering into that which is within the veil;

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where as a forerunner Jesus entered for us, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

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For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of God Most High, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him,

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to whom also Abraham divided a tenth part of all (being first, by interpretation, king of righteousness, and then also king of Salem, which is king of peace;

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without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like the Son of God), remains a priest continually.

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Now consider how great this man was, to whom even Abraham, the patriarch, gave a tenth out of the best spoils.

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They indeed of the sons of Levi who receive the priest’s office have a commandment to take tithes of the people according to the law, that is, of their brothers, though these have come out of the body of Abraham,

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but he whose genealogy is not counted from them has accepted tithes from Abraham, and has blessed him who has the promises.

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But without any dispute the lesser is blessed by the greater.

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Here people who die receive tithes, but there one receives tithes of whom it is testified that he lives.

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We can say that through Abraham even Levi, who receives tithes, has paid tithes,

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for he was yet in the body of his father when Melchizedek met him.

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Now if there was perfection through the Levitical priesthood (for under it the people have received the law), what further need was there for another priest to arise after the order of Melchizedek, and not be called after the order of Aaron?

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For the priesthood being changed, there is of necessity a change made also in the law.

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For he of whom these things are said belongs to another tribe, from which no one has officiated at the altar.

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For it is evident that our Lord has sprung out of Judah, about which tribe Moses spoke nothing concerning priesthood.

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This is yet more abundantly evident, if after the likeness of Melchizedek there arises another priest,

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who has been made, not after the law of a fleshly commandment, but after the power of an endless life:

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for it is testified, “You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek.”

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For there is an annulling of a foregoing commandment because of its weakness and uselessness

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(for the law made nothing perfect), and a bringing in of a better hope, through which we draw near to God.

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Inasmuch as he was not made priest without the taking of an oath

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(for they indeed have been made priests without an oath), but he with an oath by him that says of him, “The Lord swore and will not change his mind, ‘You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek.’”

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By so much, Jesus has become the collateral of a better covenant.

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Many, indeed, have been made priests, because they are hindered from continuing by death.

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But he, because he lives forever, has his priesthood unchangeable.

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Therefore he is also able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, seeing that he lives forever to make intercession for them.

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For such a high priest was fitting for us: holy, guiltless, undefiled, separated from sinners, and made higher than the heavens;

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who doesn’t need, like those high priests, to offer up sacrifices daily, first for his own sins, and then for the sins of the people. For he did this once for all, when he offered up himself.

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For the law appoints men as high priests who have weakness, but the word of the oath which came after the law appoints a Son forever who has been perfected.

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Now in the things which we are saying, the main point is this. We have such a high priest, who sat down on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens,

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a servant of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, not man.

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For every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices. Therefore it is necessary that this high priest also have something to offer.

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For if he were on earth, he would not be a priest at all, seeing there are priests who offer the gifts according to the law;

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who serve a copy and shadow of the heavenly things, even as Moses was warned by God when he was about to make the tabernacle, for he said, “See, you shall make everything according to the pattern that was shown to you on the mountain.”

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But now he has obtained a more excellent ministry, by so much as he is also the mediator of a better covenant, which on better promises has been given as law.

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For if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second.

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For finding fault with them, he said, “Behold, the days come,” says the Lord, “that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah;

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not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers, in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; for they didn’t continue in my covenant, and I disregarded them,” says the Lord.

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“For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel. After those days,” says the Lord; “I will put my laws into their mind, I will also write them on their heart. I will be their God, and they will be my people.

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They will not teach every man his fellow citizen, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for all will know me, from the least of them to the greatest of them.

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For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness. I will remember their sins and lawless deeds no more.”

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In that he says, “A new covenant,” he has made the first old. But that which is becoming old and grows aged is near to vanishing away.

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Now indeed even the first covenant had ordinances of divine service, and an earthly sanctuary.

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For a tabernacle was prepared. In the first part were the lampstand, the table, and the show bread; which is called the Holy Place.

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After the second veil was the tabernacle which is called the Holy of Holies,

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having a golden altar of incense, and the ark of the covenant overlaid on all sides with gold, in which was a golden pot holding the manna, Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant;

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and above it cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat, of which things we can’t speak now in detail.

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Now these things having been thus prepared, the priests go in continually into the first tabernacle, accomplishing the services,

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but into the second the high priest alone, once in the year, not without blood, which he offers for himself, and for the errors of the people.

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The Holy Spirit is indicating this, that the way into the Holy Place wasn’t yet revealed while the first tabernacle was still standing;

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which is a symbol of the present age, where gifts and sacrifices are offered that are incapable, concerning the conscience, of making the worshipper perfect;

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being only (with meats and drinks and various washings) fleshly ordinances, imposed until a time of reformation.

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But Christ having come as a high priest of the coming good things, through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this creation,

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nor yet through the blood of goats and calves, but through his own blood, entered in once for all into the Holy Place, having obtained eternal redemption.

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For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling those who have been defiled, sanctify to the cleanness of the flesh:

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how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

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For this reason he is the mediator of a new covenant, since a death has occurred for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first covenant, that those who have been called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance.

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For where a last will and testament is, there must of necessity be the death of him who made it.

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For a will is in force where there has been death, for it is never in force while he who made it lives.

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Therefore even the first covenant has not been dedicated without blood.

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For when every commandment had been spoken by Moses to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of the calves and the goats, with water and scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people,

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saying, “This is the blood of the covenant which God has commanded you.”

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Moreover he sprinkled the tabernacle and all the vessels of the ministry in the same way with the blood.

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According to the law, nearly everything is cleansed with blood, and apart from shedding of blood there is no remission.

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It was necessary therefore that the copies of the things in the heavens should be cleansed with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.

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For Christ hasn’t entered into holy places made with hands, which are representations of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us;

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nor yet that he should offer himself often, as the high priest enters into the holy place year by year with blood not his own,

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or else he must have suffered often since the foundation of the world. But now once at the end of the ages, he has been revealed to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

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Inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once, and after this, judgment,

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so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, without sin, to those who are eagerly waiting for him for salvation.

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For the law, having a shadow of the good to come, not the very image of the things, can never with the same sacrifices year by year, which they offer continually, make perfect those who draw near.

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Or else wouldn’t they have ceased to be offered, because the worshippers, having been once cleansed, would have had no more consciousness of sins?

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But in those sacrifices there is a yearly reminder of sins.

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For it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins.

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Therefore when he comes into the world, he says, “Sacrifice and offering you didn’t desire, but you prepared a body for me;