The Previous Commandment was Weak and Not Useful

Some thoughts on Hebrews 7

In Hebrews, we are now getting to an extended comparison between the cultic regulations of the first testament and the once-for-all eternal priesthood of Jesus and the second covenant. This comparison really kicks off in Hebrews 7 and runs through much of chapter 10.

Today, we’ll be focusing on this interesting passage in Hebrews 7:

For, on the one hand, the previous order is displaced because of its weakness and unusefulness—for the Covenant Code completed nothing—and, on the other, because it’s the lead-in of a better hope through which we come close to God. Hebrews 7:18–19, Scot McKnight’s The Second Testament

Let’s start with the first verse in this passage. The first commandment or order was both weak and not useful.

The word weak is translated a few different ways in the New Treatment. In Luke 10:9, among a few other passages, it is translated sick. It is also translated as helpless in Romans 5:6. That is, the first commandment did not have the proper power or strength to accomplish some particular task.

The word unusefulness, which is a great word, is only used one other time in the New Testament: Titus 3: 9. That passage says,

But avoid stupid controversies, genealogies, dissensions, and quarrels about the law, for they are unprofitable and worthless. NRSV

Just as those kinds of arguments are a waste of time, the Law was not useful when it came to the perfection of the saints. It did not have the power to accomplish such a task.

The NRSV translates the first part of verse 19, “The Law made nothing perfect.”

But why was the Law unable to accomplish perfection of the saints? Does the psalmist not say, “The law of the Lord is perfect…” (Psalm 19:11). The Law was unable to accomplish perfection for the saint because it operated in the realm of the flesh. Romans 8:3-4 explains,

For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and to deal with sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, so that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

The New Covenant, however, brings us from the realm of the flesh into the realm of the Spirit because this is the transformation Jesus, our high priest, experienced when he died. He was put to death in the flesh, but he was made alive in the Spirit.

Since we have put on Christ, we too are no longer in the flesh.

But you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. Romans 8:9

What the Law could not do, Jesus did. We now have full, face-to-face access to the Father through the Son. As our high priest, his entrance into the greater and more perfect tabernacle has paved the way for us. You and I have access to God’s presence every hour of every day. You and I have been perfected because of what Jesus has done.