earnestly pressed, sometimes into inferences which, as far as I can see,
cannot at all be borne even by the doctrine that He _is_ offering for us
now. In particular it is said that, if He in glory is offering for His
Church, then His Church must, in some sense, as in a counterpart, be
offering here on earth, in union with Him. In short, there must still be
priests on earth who are ministers of "the example and shadow of
heavenly things." But surely, if this Epistle makes anything clear, it
makes it clear that our great Priest is the superseding fulfilment of
all such ministrations done by "men having infirmity." It is His glory,
and it is ours, that He is known by us as our one and all-sufficient
Offerer and Mediator. It is precisely as such that "we have Him," in a
way to distinguish our position and privilege in a magnificent sense
from that of those who needed the sacerdotal aid of their mortal
brethren.

But then further, does this passage really intimate at all that He is
offering now? The thought appears to be decisively negatived by the
grandeur of the terms of the first verse of this chapter. Where, in the
heavenly sanctuary, is our High Priest now? He has "taken His seat on
the right hand of the throne of the majesty." But enthronement is a
thought out of line with the act and attitude of oblation. The offerer
stands before the Power he approaches. Our Priest is seated--where Deity
alone can sit.

Does not this tell us that the words (ver. 3), "It is necessary that He
too should have something to offer," are to be explained not of a
continuous historical procedure (to which idea, by the way, the aorist
verb [Greek: prosenenke] would hardly be appropriate), but as the
statement of a principle in terms of time? The "necessity" is, not that
He should have something to offer now, and to-morrow, and always, but
that the matter and act of offering should belong to Him. And they do so
belong, in principle and effect, for priestly purposes, by having been
once and for ever handled and performed by Him. His "need" is, not to be
always offering, but to be always an Offerer. He meets that need by
being for ever the Priest who had Himself to offer, and who offered
Himself, and who now dispenses from His sacerdotal seat the benedictions
based upon the sacrifice of which He is for ever the once accepted
Offerer.

Only thus viewed, I venture to say, can this phrase be read in its full
harmony with the whole Epistle. "He h