Title: Daily and Yearly Preparation for Heaven

Topic: Salvation

Summary: The daily sacrifices, weekly sabbaths, and three annual feasts prescribed in the Old Testament are a picture of how to prepare for heaven.

Use the reference links below to follow along in the Bible as you watch.

References:
2 Peter 2:22, 10
Numbers 28:1
Exodus 23:14, 17
Leviticus 23:1, 5, 10, 33
Deuteronomy 16:1, 9, 13-14
Luke 6:1
Acts of the Apostles 2:1; 20:16
Nehemiah 8:13-14
Ezekiel 45:21, 25
Zechariah 14:16
John 7:2, 37

326. These two commandments look back to all the preceding ones, and teach and command that evil actions must not be done, nor even longed for. They are therefore not merely for the external man, but also for the internal; for if anyone refrains from evil actions, but still longs to do them, he actually does them. For the Lord says:

If anyone lusts after another man's wife, he has already committed adultery with her in his heart, Matthew 5:27-28.

The external man does not become internal, or act as one with the internal, until lusts have been removed. This too is taught by the Lord, when He says:

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, because you clean the outside of the cup and dish, but the insides are full of robbery and intemperance. You blind Pharisee, clean first the inside of the cup and dish, so that the outside too may be clean, Matthew 23:25-26.

See in addition the whole of that chapter from beginning to end. The internals which are Pharisaical are longings for the things prohibited by the first, second, fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth commandments.

[2] It is well known that while He was in the world the Lord taught the interior doctrines of the church; and these forbid one to long for evil actions. This He taught, so that the internal and external man should make one. This is being born anew, as the Lord said to Nicodemus (John chapter 3). No one can be born anew or regenerated, and so become an internal man, except by the Lord's doing. In order to make these two commandments look back to all that go before, forbidding longing for them, the house is named first, then the wife, and then the man-servant, maid-servant, ox and ass, and lastly everything belonging to the neighbour. The house implies all that follows, for it contains husband, wife, man-servant, maid-servant, ox and ass. The wife who is mentioned next implies what follows, since she is the mistress, just as her husband is master in the house. The man-servant and maid-servant are under their control, and the oxen and asses under the control of the servants. Then finally come everything beneath or outside, which is called 'everything that is your neighbour's.' This makes it plain that these two commandments look back to all the preceding ones in general and in particular, both in a broad and a strict sense.