Andrew Murray: The Priesthood of the Believer Part 2

(excerpted from "The Power of the Blood of Jesus")

II. THE VOCATION OF OFFERING SPIRITUAL SACRIFICES TO GOD.

Our vocation to bring to God spiritual sacrifices
is a further privilege.

The enjoyment of the priests in drawing near to God
in His dwelling place was subordinated entirely to
something higher. They were there as servants of the
Holy Place, to bring to God, in His house, that which
belonged to Him. Only as they found joy, in drawing
near to God, could that service become truly blessed.

The service consisted in:-The bringing in of the blood
of sprinkling; the preparation of the incense to fill
the house with its fragrance; and, further, in the
ordering of everything that pertained, according to God's
word, to the arrangement of His house.

They must so guard, and serve, and provide for, the
dwelling place of the Most High, that it should be
worthy of Him, and of His glory, and that His good
pleasure in it might be fulfilled.

If the blood of Jesus brings us near, it is also,
chiefly, that we should live before God as His
servants, and bring to Him the spiritual sacrifices
which are well pleasing in His sight.

The priests brought the blood into the Holy Place
before God. In our intercourse with God there is no
offering that we can bring more pleasing to Him,
than a believing honouring of the blood of the Lamb.
Every act of humble trust, or of hearty thanksgiving,
in which we direct the attention of the Father to
the blood, and speak its praises, is acceptable to Him.

Our whole abiding there, and INTERCOURSE, from hour to
hour must be a glorifying of the blood before God.

The priests brought the incense into the Holy Place,
so as to fill God's house with fragrance. The prayers
of God's people are the delightful incense, with which
He desires to be surrounded in His habitation. The value
of prayer does not consist merely in its being the means
of obtaining things we need. No ! it has a higher aim
than that. It is a ministry of God, in which He delights.

The life of a believer who truly enjoys drawing near
to God through the blood, is a life of unceasing prayer.
In a deep sense of dependence, for each moment, for
each step, grace is sought for and expected. In the
blessed conviction of God's nearness and unchanging
goodness, the soul pours itself out in the confident
assurance of faith that every promise will be fulfilled.
In the midst of the joy which the light of God's face
bestows, there arises at the same time, along with prayer,
thanksgiving, and adoration.

These are the spiritual offerings-the offerings of
the lips of the priests of God, continually presented
to Him -they having been SANCTIFIED AND BROUGHT NIGH
BY THE BLOOD-that they might ever live and walk in His
presence.

But there is still something more. It was the duty of
the priests to attend to everything far cleansing or
provision that was necessary, in the ministry of the
House. What is the ministry now, under the New Covenant?
Thanks be to God, there are no outward nor exclusive
arrangements for divine worship. No! The Father has so
ordered, that whatever any one does who is walking in
His presence, just because of that, it becomes a
spiritual offering. Everything the believer does, if
only he does it as in God's presence, and inspired by
the priestly disposition, which offers it to God as a
service, it is a priestly sacrifice, well pleasing to
God. "Whether therefore ye eat or drink or whatever
ye do, do all to the glory of God" (I Cor. x. 31).

"Whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name
of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father
by him" (Col. iii. 17). In this way, all our actions
become thank-offerings to God.

How little Christians recognise the glory of a
life of complete consecration, to be spent always
in intercourse with God!

CLEANSED, SANCTIFIED, and BROUGHT NIGH, by the
power of the blood, my earthly calling, my whole
life, even my eating and drinking, are a spiritual
service. My work, my business, my money, my house,
everything with which I have to do, becomes sanctified
by the presence of God, because I, myself, walk in
His presence. The poorest earthly work is a priestly
service, because it is performed by a priest of God's temple.

But even this does not exhaust the glory of the
blessing of INTERCOURSE. The highest blessing of the
priesthood is, that the priest appears as the
REPRESENTATIVE of OTHERS, BEFORE GOD.

from chapter six
(continued tomorrow)


Andrew Murray
the priesthood of the believer