This message will probably speak the most
to people who are religious.
People who tend to think that works are the way to go.
And the truth of the matter is even those of us who are,
I would say Baptist, who believe
the Orthodox who believe that we're not saved by good works,
but we're saved by the grace and the goodness of God,
the blood of Jesus Christ,
sometimes we may tend to believe
that our good works make us accepted by God.
And the truth is God's already accepted us.
Aren't you glad you're accepted by God?
I'm so glad for that too.
I'm so excited to have Miles back.
And I'm excited to have Anna here with us.
And they were married just a couple of weeks ago,
Miles is our youth pastors, if some of you don't know.
And I'm excited about all that that means.
It made me think a lot this week with them coming back about
when I first got married and my wife and us getting married
and all the way back in 2006,
there were different times back then.
I don't know, maybe not.
But we gave each other wedding gifts.
Did you guys give wedding gifts?
Did you exchange gifts with your bride and back in the day?
I did.
Somebody told me to do that.
I think it might have been like Walmart or something.
I don't know, somebody told me,
I didn't buy it at Walmart.
We got it at the jewelry store, right?
Did I get you jewelry?
Why are you, shake yes or no?
What are, okay, I should remember this.
But I gave her some jewelry.
She gave me a hardcover set of the Chronicles of Narnia.
Jaime has known that the Chronicles of Narnia is, okay.
She gave me that.
She also gave, there's a focus on the family
radio dramatization of that, which is really, really good.
Focus on the family did it.
And it's really interesting through the years,
I really enjoyed those stories because of the power of metaphor,
the power of a picture to relate to something that's true.
You know, just because it's fiction,
doesn't mean that there isn't some truth in there to learn.
And there have been times now
that I've read some of those books to my kids.
And while I did, something that was said in the story
that points to something true about God or true about Jesus.
And I find myself with something in my throat
or a tear in my eye.
And there's been a couple of times where I've been reading
and for the kids, it's just a story.
It's going over their head.
And they're thinking about a lion
and I'm thinking about Jesus.
Do you guys know what I'm talking about?
There have been times where the story points to something true
about God, about creation, about Christ,
about redemption, courage, and the like.
And there begins to have that moment.
There's a moment in one of the books called
The Voyage of the Don Treader,
where the children must leave and go back to their world
from this imaginary world called Narnia.
And when they do, they tell Aslan, who's a picture of Jesus,
in the books, that they don't want to leave this magical place
because when they go to this magical place,
Aslan won't be there.
And he said, this is what, this is the exchange in the book.
Isn't it Narnia?
It isn't Narnia you know, Saab Lucy.
This is them leaving.
Lucy's one of the children.
It isn't Narnia you know, it's you.
We want, we shan't meet you there.
And how can we live never meeting you?
And he says, but you shan't meet me, dear one, said Aslan.
Are you there too, sir, said Edmund?
I am said Aslan, but there I have another name.
You must learn to know me by that name.
This was the very reason why you were brought to Narnia,
that by knowing me here for a little,
you may know me better there.
Now when C.S. Lewis wrote those words,
he wasn't saying that there's an actual place called Narnia.
And an actual line that is the same as Jesus.
So don't get wrapped up or get messed up in all of that.
He's saying something about the purpose
of the fiction that he wrote.
He's telling the reader that he's been trying
to teach the reader something about the real,
something about the true, something about Jesus.
One pastor said this about the subject
of the text that we're gonna come today.
He said, in this book talking about,
he's comparing these two books, right?
He's comparing Narnia.
And C.S. Lewis's well-known Chronicles of Narnia,
he describes how several quite ordinary English children
while playing hide and seek enter
into an ordinary English wardrobe,
pressing deeper into the familiar garments,
they suddenly find themselves in a strange and mysterious
land.
Some such phenomenon occurs to those who think deeply
about what the scripture says about the humble structure
of skins and panels called the tabernacle.
At first, all this factual, measurable, and straightforward.
In Exodus, Moviticus, God gives direction
to the children of Israel, to Moses about building
this thing called the tabernacle
that we're gonna look at today.
But as we press deeper, the walls silently move back,
the temple surrounded by myriads of worshiping angels
and watching the ritual of redemption through holy,
transformed eyes.
Now, what am I trying to say?
Certainly there is no Narnia, don't get hung up on that.
But God is an incredible storyteller and he cannot lie.
He tells incredible stories and we've been learning
the story of redemption in the book of Hebrews.
The first part of Hebrews tells us that Jesus is greater
in his person.
How many of you guys agree Jesus is greater?
He is greater, he's better than anything
or anyone, he is greater.
We are in the middle part of the book of Hebrews.
It tells us that Jesus is not just greater in his person,
but being greater in his person,
Jesus is greater in his ministry.
Do you know that Jesus has a ministry now?
That ministry is what we've been talking about.
What is his ministry now?
Well, we learned the sum of it a few weeks ago
when we studied, two weeks ago,
when we studied the whole chapter of Hebrews chapter eight.
And that Hebrews chapter eight started out this way,
verse one, now of the things which we have spoken,
this is the sum.
Hebrews eight, chapter one, verse one.
Of the things which we have spoken, this is the sum.
We have such an high priest.
What kind of high priest do we have?
Who is set on the right hand of the throne
of the majesty in the heavens.
A minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle.
This is amazing.
Which the Lord pitched and not man.
For every high priest is ordained to offer gifts
and sacrifices wherefore it is of necessity
that this man has something also to offer.
When I told you my comments on those verses,
what I told you last week in my comments on those verses
is that God has been writing a story in that old testament,
that old economy, who here has ever heard of the tabernacle?
Okay, if you haven't, I'm gonna teach you about it today.
The old tabernacle and that old tabernacle
was where the old sacrificial system was done.
And like sometimes a story can point to something real,
God revealed through the tabernacle to,
and it was a real thing.
It really happened in history.
There really was a guy named Moses.
There really was a children of Israel.
God really came to them and gave them the dimensions
for this tabernacle, but that wasn't the first one.
That wasn't the first one.
There's a real one.
And it's one that men didn't make, it's one that God made.
And this particular tabernacle is pointing
to the real tabernacle.
Are you getting the picture?
Are you getting the connection?
It's pointing to something he says in verse two,
the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched and not man.
A true tabernacle and a true sanctuary that the Lord pitched.
It's not that the one from Exodus was false,
but that it was not the first.
We'll see from future verses here in today's text
that the one in Exodus is the copy and not the original.
God revealed to us through this Old Testament,
this sacrificial system, this old covenant,
something that would help us understand the real.
And this is exactly what the writer of Hebrews
wants us to examine today.
He's writing to Jewish people.
It's always important when you come to a verse,
when you come to a set of verses,
here's some questions you need to have
at least understood when you come to it.
Who is the audience?
Who is writing?
When did they write it?
And what's the context of what he's writing to?
The person who's, we don't know exactly who wrote
the book of Hebrews in terms of an individual.
We know when he wrote it.
He wrote it after Jesus came.
It was dead, buried and rose again.
He wrote it before the temple was destroyed in 8070.
So this is very early in Christianity coming to the four,
coming to the church being established, right?
And he's writing to people, he's writing to Jewish people
who are at least considering and probably have believed
in many of them, believed in Jesus, some considering Jesus.
And they're getting to this place where for their whole
entire lives, they've been going to the temple.
They've been going to this place, a temple,
which was kind of the more permanent part of that
tabernacle that was set up in the wilderness.
The temple is this permanent place.
And you know what they did in the temple?
They did sacrifices.
That's where the priests were, they did that.
And so he's writing to these people who are believing
in Jesus or at least considering Jesus,
but now they're starting to feel guilty
because what the author is considering is that,
well, back to verse chapter eight, look at verse 13.
He says this.
In that he saith a new covenant.
Now let me tell you about who's talking.
The writer of Hebrews has quoted Jeremiah.
By the way, if you're not in Sunday school,
you should be in Sunday school.
Today we started a study in the book of Jeremiah.
So if you don't have a Sunday school class, get one.
You'll learn a lot.
The writer of Hebrews quotes Jeremiah
who says something about the fact that there's gonna come
a new covenant.
And what the writer of Hebrews says in chapter eight,
verse 13, which we studied two weeks ago, is this.
In that he, Jeremiah, saith a new covenant.
A new covenant, he hath made the first old.
Now that which decays and waxeth old,
the old covenant, the old sacrificial system,
all of that, he maketh, he says,
now that which decays and waxeth old
and is ready to vanish away.
Now, you wanna get people nervous.
Start messing with their traditions.
I'm a pastor.
Sometimes we make decisions that may mess up
somebody's traditions.
Not everybody likes every decision the pastor makes.
Has you guys ever heard of that happening?
It's just recently came to me.
No, just joking.
Like, this is what happens.
And so, if he's gonna make the claim that this old system
is waxing old and decays away,
he better go to the word of God.
And he did, he went to Jeremiah and Jeremiah says,
hey, there's a new covenant that's coming.
And of course, what the writer of Hebrews
is trying to say is, if there's a new one,
that means the old one is now being fulfilled.
It is now obsolete.
There is a new covenant because the old covenant
couldn't do all that was needed to be done
to fully and finally redeem mankind.
Here's the good news.
The old covenant was based on the law.
Anybody here have trouble keeping the rules?
Some of you are lying right now.
Which tells me you have trouble keeping the rules.
Right?
I mean, we all do.
The old covenant was based on, as we will see,
some mediation that had to happen in sacrifices
were the sacrifices of, as it says in our texts,
bulls and goats, sheep, animals.
The old system, what we're gonna find out today
can be done away because Jesus Christ finished work
and continuing ministry.
And that's what the writer is saying.
So the tabernacle that we're gonna study today,
don't get sleepy on me, okay?
This is exciting stuff.
I'll try to keep you excited.
Here we go.
The tabernacle shows us how much Jesus Christ is greater.
And we can see this in three observations described for us
in Hebrews chapter nine, verses one through 14.
Now, Brother Randy did not read for us verses one through 10,
but that's what we gotta examine first
to understand what we did read.
So look at chapter nine, verse one.
Here's what it says.
Read this with me.
The first thing we're gonna see is the sanctuary examined.
The sanctuary examined, verse one.
Then barely the first covenant,
that's the old covenant, the Old Testament,
the old sacrificial system, okay?
Had also ordinances of divine service.
So there were ordinances, these things that God ordained
for them to do, and a worldly sanctuary.
Now, when you use the word worldly,
sometimes old religious people say,
don't wear that dress, that's worldly.
Don't play with, don't listen to that music.
That music is worldly.
Here, worldly doesn't mean like bad,
it just means that it was earthly, it was of this world.
Are you guys with me?
So he says in the Old Testament,
you had these rituals that God ordained to do,
and those rituals were done in a worldly,
what does it say, worldly sanctuary, right?
So you had ordinances and you had a physical sanctuary
called here a worldly sanctuary.
Here it is.
This is a kind of a rough sketch of what the,
this would be like a overhead view
of what the old tabernacle and the wilderness look like.
There was an outer, what you see as lines
all the way around the sides, really all the lines
that were making structures here are basically tents.
There are poles and animal skins,
and there was an outer court that only Jewish men
could go into, the Jewish women could not go in there.
That's where the brazen altar were,
that's where the sacrifices were made there,
the brazen altar, the laborer is a place
where they would wash.
Then you had the first veil that was at the doorway,
you see where it says doorway here,
and you had a second veil, which was the inner part.
So in that, let's keep reading, okay?
Verse two, you have the outer room,
you have the outer room that's described in verse two.
For there was a tabernacle made,
who made the tabernacle?
God or man?
This one was made by man, okay?
It was given to Moses to make,
God said there were specific men that would make it,
and they created it.
Verse two, there was a tabernacle made,
the first wherein was the candlestick
and the table and the showbread,
which is called the sanctuary, back to our diagram.
In that first place, in that actual physical tabernacle,
the holy place, there was a golden candlestick,
the showbread, there was an altar of incense,
that's what's described right here in verse two.
That holy place could only be, they could only go in there,
the only people that could go in there
were the priests, we'll read about that later.
This place was called the sanctuary,
this is the place that only a priest could go into,
and many priests did go into this place,
and they went in there on a daily basis.
They performed ordinances, as we'll talk about.
Then there's an inner room, there's an outer room,
there's an inner room, there's the holy place,
and then there was the holy of holies,
you guys got it right.
Verses three to five talking about this,
and after the second veil, the tabernacle,
which is called the holiest of all,
which had the golden censor and the Ark of the Covenant
overlaid around with gold, wherein was the golden pot
that had the manna and errands rod that butted,
and the tables of the Covenant,
and of over it the cherubimms of glory,
shadowing the mercy seat,
of which we cannot now speak particularly.
In that second place, there were a couple things,
one thing that was in here, it says the golden censor,
and then it says that there was the Ark of the Covenant,
who guys remember the Ark of the Covenant?
The Indiana Jones looked after and pursued,
no, that's totally different, okay, that wasn't real.
Okay, there was the Ark of the Covenant,
it was overlaid with gold,
and it says that it had inside wherein was the golden pot
that had the manna and errands rod that butted,
you guys remember that God performed that miracle,
that errands rod actually started to grow,
and then there was also, it says,
the tables of the Covenant,
what were the tables of the Covenant?
That was the Ten Commandments,
remember when Moses was up on Mount Sinai,
he brought down the Ten Commandments,
and then he broke them,
and then they had to go back and get new ones,
and they brought them down,
and they put them in the Ark of the Covenant.
And then it says in verse five,
and over it the cherubimms of glory,
shadowing the mercy seat,
of which we cannot now speak particularly.
This is an artist's rendition
of what the Ark could have looked like.
In that Ark, on the Ark there were two angels,
and they're described to look something like this,
nobody knows exactly,
and that's exactly what he says in verse five,
of which now we cannot speak particularly
because they did not have the Ark at that time.
It really was a lost Ark.
And so he's saying this is what's in there.
Now, God is a revealer.
He used time and history to reveal
all that he wanted to reveal.
He knows what he's doing and revealing some to some,
but not all to all.
And we could and can and should trust him,
even when we don't understand everything.
We do not know everything he does.
These people, this is what I was trying to relate
in my introduction.
The people that were performing these rituals,
these ordinances, this old covenant,
the people that were submitting to it,
they don't have what we have.
I want you to realize how privileged we are.
We have the ability to look back at all of this history,
and the old covenant, that old sacrificial system,
the Ark of the Covenant, the Tabernacle,
all of it was pointing to something real.
All of it was pointing to a person,
the person of Jesus Christ, the whole thing.
And so this is amazing.
It takes a minute to understand, but let's talk about it.
Now, let's talk about the service.
We'll go into what he says here.
Number two, not only do you have the sanctuary examined,
and let me tell you that all of the things
that I just taught you about what was in the Tabernacle
and all that went on in there,
that could be a month's long study looking at each piece
and what it represents.
Maybe one day I'll do that,
but that gives you some indication of what that looked like.
The Jewish reader reading that
would have already understood, yeah, yeah,
there was a Tabernacle in the Outer Court,
and the outer sanctuary, the holy place where the priests
would go, and then there was the holy of holies,
the place that only the high priest would go once a year,
and that leads us to number two, the service.
Explain, you had ordinances and you had the sanctuary.
We just talked about the sanctuary.
What were the ordinances?
What were they doing all the time in that Tabernacle?
Well, let's look at what the priests wrought in verse six.
What the priests wrought, verse six.
Now, when these things were thus ordained, here it is.
The priests, what kind of priests?
Were they human?
Were they Levitical?
Were they Aaronic?
Right, those old Aaronic that old Aaronic priests did.
They went all the way into the first Tabernacle,
accomplishing the service of God.
Here it says the word ordained.
And it speaks to the fact that this was chosen
and instituted by God.
He refers to the priest speaking of the old Aaronic order,
which is dying and has come to an end.
And it says here that they went always,
meaning this was a daily ministry.
This is not something they just did once.
They had to do this ministry all the time.
They were always mediating to God
on behalf of the people for sins,
since they were so continuous.
The sin never stopped.
So the sacrifices never stopped.
Are you with me?
Every day there's new sacrifices that have to be made
because sin kept happening.
Day after day, year after year,
the blood of the animals never stopped.
The sacrifices never stopped
because sin never stopped.
And the sacrifices were never, ever, ever enough.
So you have the priest daily ministering
in that first place, the holy place.
And then it says in verse seven,
but into the second, meaning into the holy of holies
and that second, past that second veil,
went the high priest alone how often?
Once every year.
When he went in, it wasn't every day.
It was once a year.
It was on the day of atonement.
And then it makes this really interesting point.
Not without blood.
When he went in, what did he take?
He took blood, which he offered for himself
and for the errors of the people.
This priest was not an innocent priest.
He had to go to God.
In fact, in the Old Testament,
we know that the shekinah glory of God in that cloud
and the pillar of fire by night
emanated some of the time from the holy of holies.
And to go into where the presence of God was,
he could only do that once.
No man has seen God and lived, the Bible says.
It is a fearful thing to enter into the presence of God.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
And so if we're gonna go into the presence of God,
we need some ability, some reason to be able to go in.
And what was pictured here is that that priest would go in
and every time he went in, he went in with blood.
The top of that ark was called the mercy seat.
And that priest would take the blood
and he would sprinkle the blood.
When he went into that holy place,
the holy of holies into the presence of God,
he would sprinkle the blood on the mercy seat.
That's what would happen.
The different placement and different action.
The second speaks of that inner veil.
And in that place, in verses three to five,
with the sense of the Ark of the Covenant,
he did not go in without blood.
The Bible says that without the shedding of blood,
there is no remissions of sins.
Whose sins? It says here, for first for himself,
he needed redemption for himself.
He needed atonement for himself.
The priests were not themselves sinless.
They needed cleansing and forgiveness
before they could represent the people to God.
Now let me just pause and say in our day,
who here would like to stop sinning?
Who here understands that there's a penalty for sin?
And that sin needs to be atoned for.
Sin needs to be covered.
Here we find sin didn't stop.
We need to stay in tune with God
and fill with the Holy Spirit so I can confess
and be close to God based on the sacrifice that Jesus made.
Another word for this is the word abide.
I need to abide with Jesus.
Sin doesn't stop, but blood was the cost.
The blood of Jesus Christ washes away from all sin,
the Bible says.
So we have what the priests wrought.
Now let's talk about what the spirit taught.
Here in Hebrews, we find out what the spirit taught.
Verse eight, the Holy Ghost, this signifying.
Now let me tell you what an amazing thing you just read was.
Why is he saying the Holy Ghost, this signifying?
He's saying that whole setup,
Steve can you go back to the diagrams?
I know I'm messing you up.
Are you with me?
This earthly tabernacle and the priesthood
that served in this earthly tabernacle.
And all of the ordinances and all of the sacrifices
and all of the picture in that ritualistic ceremonial law
was pointing to something that the Holy Ghost
was trying to say.
Now here's what's amazing.
This is incredible.
Up until this point,
up until this point in the church age,
up until people like Paul and the writer of Hebrews
helped us understand this,
they didn't quite understand all of what it meant.
You know there's gonna be a time in heaven
where we're gonna find out things that God is doing right now
that we didn't realize what he was trying to do.
And we're gonna have him go, oh that's what it was for.
Here's another way of saying that, we don't know everything.
We don't know everything.
Without faith it's impossible to.
Please God.
Here's what the writer, the Holy Ghost now
is trying to tell us through this passage
that God had a purpose for all of this the whole time.
The Holy Ghost thus signifying
that the way into the holiest of all
was not yet made manifest
while as the first tabernacle was yet standing.
You know what he was trying to say is?
This was never God's plan for ultimate final redemption.
Are you with me?
This was a plan but it's the old plan
and that old plan was never God's final word
on what needed to happen for sin.
You did not bring a sheep with you today.
You think kids are hard to bring to church?
Try a sheep.
Sheep are dumb, right?
Aren't you glad?
You didn't bring a bull or a goat.
The tabernacle was never God's final plan.
Verse nine, which was a figure for the time then present
in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices
that could not make him that did the service perfect
as pertaining to the conscience.
You know what that means?
You did what God told you to do.
And you offered the sacrifices.
The Bible tells us very clearly what happened
to those people Ben, what was the point of all of it?
Did they get redemption by doing that?
They did by faith.
But they did ultimately because Jesus is the one
who did the sacrifice that then pointed back
to what was happening back then.
Here's my point is this.
Everybody that gets to heaven, even the people
that did this ritual, they don't get to heaven
based on the blood of bulls and goats and sheep.
They get to heaven the same way we get to heaven
by the blood of Jesus Christ.
Do you get it?
He's saying here that they kept having to do sacrifices.
The sacrifices atoned for the sins that were passed,
but just as soon, can you imagine, have you ever been here?
I've been here even in my relationship with God.
I confessed to God, my sin and try to get right with him.
And 10 minutes later I messed up.
Anybody ever have that happen?
Imagine that being that it's not just I confessed to God
and it cleanses me from sin, but that I also have to bring
a sheep in and do it.
Here I just sacrifice a sheep and here I go sinning again.
He said it didn't make those that did the service perfect.
It didn't mature him and it didn't, and that's
pertain to the conscience.
He says in verse 10, which stood only in meats and drinks
and diverse washings, carnal ordinances,
imposed on them until the time of Reformation.
This system, these laws that kept people out of the holy
of holies, the most obvious place that God used to display
his presence, it kept people at a distance from God.
They had to have priests who through the ceremonial law
were able to go in on their behalf into the holy of holies
where they could not go.
They could not go into that veil.
The sacrifices of these animals could not fully and finally
perfect them or assuage their consciences in the right way.
It was truly and predominantly ceremonial.
They were just pictures of the real.
They were just shadows of the authentic.
They were temporary.
Now in a way we deal with this and in a way we do not.
We have a real priest, Jesus Christ, who fully and finally
sacrificed himself for us.
He is both the priest and the sacrifice.
That's what's amazing.
And it's by him that our sins are forgiven and we're saved.
Yet we live by faith because our salvation is not fully realized
being in this earth in the flesh.
We're not yet in heaven.
Who's looking forward to heaven?
That full salvation?
We're closer and have more access than they did.
It's just that we wait on the redemption of our bodies.
The Holy Spirit is the down payment.
And that's what Ephesians tells me.
There's inheritance coming that I have not yet received.
And the Holy Spirit that's given to me is the down payment.
Paul says in Ephesians on that inheritance.
So praise the Lord that he has made us that way.
So we've seen the sanctuary examined.
We've seen the service explained.
Now let's look at the Savior exalted.
The Savior exalted.
Look at verse 11.
We see in verse 11 and 12 a superior payment.
Here's what it says, verse 11,
but Christ being come and high priest of good things to come.
Who's excited for good things to come?
Heaven's gonna be awesome.
Freedom from pain, from guilt, seeing our loved ones,
but most importantly seeing Him, seeing Jesus.
He has become a high priest of good things to come
by a greater and a more perfect tabernacle,
not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building.
The sanctuary he's in is not like that one up there.
And I felt like the one on the board.
The sanctuary he's in is in heaven.
He's in a tabernacle, not made with hands.
He's where God is and where God has made.
Verse 12, neither by the blood of goats and calves.
He didn't get in there because of that.
But by his own blood.
He entered in once into the holy place.
How many times?
How many times did Jesus need to be sacrificed?
Yeah.
Not every week.
Once.
He entered in once into the holy place, having obtained.
Having obtained, it's already done.
It's in past tense, having obtained, it's done.
Having obtained eternal redemption for us.
Through Christ we have good things to come.
This speaks of the eternal heavenly realities
at this first tabernacle.
And all the ordinances we're pointing to as shadows and pictures.
Jesus serves in a perfect tabernacle that was built by God.
It's heavenly.
It's eternal.
It's where God's presence is manifest.
He mediates this covenant.
Having made a better payment through a better sacrifice.
He doesn't sacrifice animals every day.
That's no longer needed.
No, he sacrificed himself once for all.
And it's on this basis that he's obtained a never ending,
everlasting eternal redemption for us.
He gives one kind of life.
That's eternal life.
And eternal life starts now and lasts forever.
You can't lose it.
Because you didn't pay for it.
You didn't earn it.
He did.
The payment has been made.
It covers our full sin debt.
And is the way that we are freed from the penalty of our sin.
It's the payment that frees us from being slaves to sin.
This eternal payment for sin causes me to conclude a couple
of applications personally.
Maybe this will help you.
Number one, I should trust in this Christ as my only shot at
redemption.
He didn't have to pay for his own sins.
He's perfect.
He became sin who knew no sin that we may be made the righteousness
of God and him.
He's my only shot.
It's my only way to enter the holiest heavenly place in the
presence of God.
Number two, it's my reasonable service and a worship to live
for him.
Look at what Jesus did for us.
He sacrificed himself.
He spilled his own blood.
He's the only one for you and for me.
It's reasonable.
It's logical for me to worship and to live for him,
especially because he calls me to glorify him.
And the best way I do that is to share this good news with
everybody I can.
So to repeat, brother Massey, everything else is secondary.
Primary is this.
I don't need to know that Jesus died for them.
They need to know it.
His sacrifice led to my redemption.
My redemption should lead me to offering my body as a living
sacrifice back to him.
And what he calls me to do in being a living sacrifice is to
tell the world about what he has done for them.
And by the way, I can look at anybody and say to them, Jesus
died for you.
Because Jesus died for everybody.
He died for everybody.
The atonement is not limited to just the ones who would believe.
He became a propitiation for our sins and not for our sins only,
but for the sin of the whole world.
It's sufficient for everybody and sufficient for those who believe.
It's a superior payment.
And it gives us, let it be, a superior purging.
Look at verse 13.
For if the blood, this is so good.
For if the blood of bulls and of goats and the ashes of a
heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctified to the purifying of
the flesh.
You know what I'm saying?
If God did do a work in that moment of allowing the blood of
those animals to atone for sin, but that atonement wasn't
permanent, there's a whole bunch to that.
Verse 14.
How much more shall the...
Let me say that again.
How much more?
Bulls, goats, heifers, lambs.
How much better shall the blood of Christ, who through the
eternal spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your
consciences from dead works to serve the living God?
What an incredible verse.
In the old economy, the old covenant that God set up through
Moses, he recognized the blood of bulls and goats as a substitute
sacrifice.
The bloodbought remission of sin because of the faith displayed
through that obedience and sacrifice.
Even in that old covenant, God accepted the substitute of these
bulls and goats because those sacrifices pointed to the sacrifice
that Jesus would make later.
Even everyone only gets to the Father through Jesus because of
the payment he made.
The word here for unclean is the word common.
The blood of bulls and goats animated and activated people to
live a life separated unto God.
Those Jewish people were dedicated to that system.
You guys get that, right?
They were doing...
They were responding to the light that they had.
They were obeying the law that God had given, and they should
have been doing that.
But here comes the writer of Hebrews to say, hey, that system
is over.
And you don't have to try to use that system to purge your
consciences and to make you feel...
Anybody here deal with guilt and shame?
You ever feel bad for your sin?
He said, you don't have to...
You don't have to do the old system to deal with your sin and
your shame and the guilt that you deal with, both emotionally
and in reality.
You don't have to do that anymore.
What's way better than bulls and goats getting sacrificed for
you is the Son of God who sacrificed himself for you.
That's what he's saying.
It was a sacrifice that they made that old way to impact their
consciences.
They dealt with their own guilt through the temporary earthly
sacrifice, sanctified them.
But notice the question of verse 14, how much more?
Think about how much better the blood of Christ is than the
blood of those animals.
How more precious is it to God, the blood of his own son than
the blood of those animals?
Christ's blood is far more precious than the blood that was
spilled all those years.
Those animals are dead, but he lives.
He lives.
Christ's blood is far more precious.
He lives forever, and he purges our consciences in a way that
those sacrifices never could.
His work is done once for all.
We are not sanctified by those old things.
We're saved by him.
And so what the writer of Hebrews is trying to help those
Hebrews understand is that they don't have to feel bad about
leaving that old ceremony and sacrificial system.
The blood of Jesus Christ is so much greater than what the old
picture was trying to convey.
The eternal actual sanctuary not made with hands is so much
better than the earthly tabernacle down here on earth.
And the only way I can get to that place is because of Jesus.
The sacrifice that Jesus made not only deals with my sin at the
legal level, Jesus' sacrifice deals with my sin at the emotional
level.
His blood sacrifice for me takes away my guilt and shame.
It's not that I'm proud of my sin.
Pride is not a virtue.
Just leave that out there.
Pride is not a virtue.
Pride is deadly.
I'm not proud of my sin.
You should not be proud of your sin either.
It's not that we don't regret our sins.
It's that my sin no longer defined who I am.
I'm in Christ.
You're in Christ.
If you put your faith and trust in Jesus because he died on the
cross for your sin, you're in Christ.
That's your identity now.
I'm a sinner that's been saved by grace.
I'm not a slave to sin.
I'm a son.
I'm adopted by the Father.
I'm an heir and a joint heir with Jesus Christ.
Are you kidding me?
I get to be a joint heir with Jesus Christ and the down payment
of that inheritance is the person of the Holy Spirit living inside
of me and now I don't go to a tabernacle.
Now I am the tabernacle.
Now he lives inside of me.
Why do you not know that your body is a temple of God?
The temple of the Holy Ghost.
That's amazing.
He gives me a new identity and a new hope.
Do you know what that means for you and me?
It means I don't have to be saved by ritual.
I don't get saved by ceremony.
I don't get saved by any work.
I don't have to have perfect attendance.
I'd like for you to have perfect attendance.
You keep coming to church.
But don't come to church thinking that's what's going to get you there.
I don't come because I have to come.
I come because I get to come.
Get to see all of you in fellowship and dig into God's
word and honor God.
You know what we are saying about today?
My worth is not in what I own.
It's not in what I do.
My worth is in the blood of Christ that flowed from Calvary.
Talk about value.
I'm not saved by ritual.
I'm not saved by tradition.
I'm not saved by dead works and dead religion.
I'm saved because of the blood of Jesus that was shed for me.
I'm saved because he said,
if I would confess with my mouth the Lord Jesus
and believe in my heart that God raised him from the dead,
I'd be saved.
Jesus did all that work.
I don't have to work.
Not for my salvation.
In fact, I cannot work myself to get to heaven.
I'm there.
I can get there.
And you can get there only because of the blood of Jesus Christ.
What can one do?
One can take away the blood of Jesus Christ.
What can wash away my sin?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.