John Brown, Hebrews Quote 15

Hebrews by John Brown  p.235

‘Since we have a High Priest—one to interpose with God on our behalf—one to expiate our sins and to make intercession for us; since our High Priest is an illustrious personage, who has entered into the immediate presence of God, thus proving the acceptance of His sacrifice and the prevalence of His intercession; since He is indeed the only begotten of God, the divinity of whose nature gives infinite virtue to His sacrifice, and secures uniform success to His interpositions; and since, though so inconceivably great and glorious, He is not withstanding, from His having assumed our nature and submitted to our condition, at once capable of and disposed to sympathize with us in all our trials, having Himself, so far as the absolute purity of His nature admitted, been exposed to the same trials,--let us persevere in the acknowledgement we have made, and instead of falling before the temptations to abandon Christ and His cause, let us, in the exercise of an enlightened and affectionate devotion, seek from God, the propitiated Divinity, in the exercise of His pity for our weakness and misery, and of His grace towards us who are utterly undeserving, those aids of His good Spirit which are at once absolutely necessary and abundantly sufficient to enable us to “hold fast the beginning of our confidence stedfast to the end,” amid all the trials to which we are exposed.’  The exhortation was peculiarly appropriate to the Hebrew Christians in their circumstances.  It is suited, however, to Christians of all countries and ages.  The grand leading outlines of state, character and education of true Christians are independent of the circumstances of time and place.  The two great duties of the Christian are, the believing study of the truth respecting Jesus Christ, and the cultivation of a habitual affectionate intercourse with God as the God of peace, under the influence of the faith of “the truth as it is in Jesus.”