One Sacrifice for All Time — Hebrews 10

0:01 Let's pray. Heavenly father, we come to you once again this morning. We thank you for this time that we have to open your your word. We ask that you would speak to our hearts and to our minds today and Let your spirit guide us through your word today. In Christ name, amen.

0:28 Turn in your Bibles to Hebrews chapter 10. Hebrews chapter 10. Last time I was up here in end of July or August, I was dealing with a lovely Tennessee version of some really awful cold. And so, I'm usually pretty dry up here, but it was the extra extra dry version that you had of me last time. So, I'm feeling a lot better today than I was back then.

1:00 So, you just have to deal with the regular dry version of me today. But it's funny. Years... I don't know how many years ago it was. Ray was the one who pointed it out to me, and he didn't use the word dry.

1:16 But when he was he was giving me some shepherding about speaking and and and Ray, I still love you for it, brother. Thank I'm still working on it. I'm trying to be a little bit more colorful and energetic, but anyway, it's not what I do naturally, but thanks, Ray. I'm still working on it. Hebrews chapter 10.

1:36 I'm actually hoping to to get through the bulk of this chapter. As I started thinking about wanting to get through the first 18, 19 verses ish, I I then realized that there's a continuation of thought that I really wanted to finish to get through verse 31 or so and then since there was only another seven verses after that, I thought, well, it's not really related, not quite, but I'll see if I get you all through with it. But I wanted to continue with thought today. I wanted to get through the bulk of this and take this large portion so that we have a better sense of the author's argument. I like taking two verses and spending an hour on it, but I often like to get a really big picture.

2:29 So let's read the first 18 verses. Hebrews 10. For the law, since it has only a shadow of the good things to come and not the very form of things, can never by the same sacrifices year by year which they offer continually make perfect those who draw near. Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered because the worshipers having once been cleansed would no longer have had consciousness of sins But in those sacrifices, there is a reminder of sins year by year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

3:06 Therefore, when he comes into the world, he says, sacrifice and offering thou hast not desired but a body thou hast prepared for me. In whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou hast taken no pleasure. Then I said, behold, I have come. In the role of the book, it is written of me to do thy will, oh god. After saying above, sacrifices and offerings and whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou hast not desired nor hast thou taken pleasure in them, which are offered according to the law, then he said, behold, I have come to do thy will.

3:40 He takes away the first in order to establish the second. By this will, we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. And every priest stands daily ministering and offering time after time the same sacrifices which can never take away sins, but he, having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time onward until his enemies be made a footstool for his feet. For one by for by one offering he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified. And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us, for after saying, this is the covenant that I will make with them.

4:22 After those days says the Lord, I will put my laws upon their heart and upon their mind I will write them. He then says, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more. Now where there is forgiveness of these things, there is no longer any offering for sin. We'll stop there for a moment. This chapter gives us one of the most I think, one of the most astounding arguments for Christ's perfect sacrifice and the assurance of our permanent salvation.

5:03 There are other passages in Scripture that speak about this, but this is one of the most fantastic ones. And as I read through this, I feel that the author beats us over the head a little with it in repetition, because we need that. So starting back verses one through four, we see that the law was a shadow, it was an image. Any image is a poor substitute for reality, right? No matter how good cameras get, no matter how good televisions get, you look outside and it doesn't matter what image you have, it will never be the same as looking at the real thing.

6:24 The law reminds us every single time that a sacrifice is made, it reminds us of sin and the presence of sin. And the sacrifices covered over the sin but didn't remove it. It wasn't permanent. It wasn't complete. Couple months ago when I was very ill, I was taking Nyquil so I could try to sleep at night so I could breathe a little bit and not cough so much.

6:52 And the Nyquil does help, right? It alleviates some of the symptoms, but it does not do anything to solve the problem. I like to let my own immune system solve the problem, but I don't mind taking some stuff to help me sleep at night. But it just covers it and you keep taking this stuff and all it does is remind you that you're still sick and it's not fixing anything. And this is what the sacrifices did.

7:17 They just reminded them of their sin. They never actually dealt with the problem. They never removed sin. They were covered over until next time. In verses five through 10, now that we've established that the law was just a picture or a shadow, now he talks about the contrast of the weak Levitical offerings with Christ's superlative offering.

7:49 And he quotes Psalm 40. This is this is Psalm 40 here. And it reveals to us God's ultimate dissatisfaction with the old law. Now he instituted it, it was his and it wasn't an accident. He didn't institute the old law then say, shoot that didn't work.

8:08 Let's try this one. We know that's that it was all part of God's plan and this is what he gave them, But it was not his ultimate plan for salvation. It was not his ultimate plan for cleansing the human race. It was insufficient. Sacrifice and offering thou hast not desired but a body thou hast prepared for me.

8:33 Thou hast taken no pleasure in sin in in the sacrifices. How many times do we read about the the about Israel's heart not being in it. They were doing the things. They were they were following the law sometimes. And then, when we get to the New Testament, the Pharisees had taken the law to 11 but there was no heart in it.

9:05 And that applies just as much to us today as it did then. We get stuck going through motions The sacrifices and offerings, it's not what God's after, but a body that he prepared for himself through the incarnation. So the old covenant is dispensed with the new covenant. The author repeats the quotation in verse eight. He repeats Psalm 40, he condenses it and then immediately shows how Christ steps up to reveal what does actually please the Father.

9:49 He takes away the first to establish the second. If I walk out there, and I'm holding a picture of that, whatever swamp in front of my face, I still can't see the real thing clearly because I'm still holding the picture in front of my face. It's gotta be dealt away. It's it's gotta be moved. So, we can, the first has to be removed to make room for the second.

10:59 First Corinthians six eleven puts it this way and such were some of you but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and in the spirit of our God. Romans three twenty five whom god displayed publicly as a propitiation in his blood through faith. This was to demonstrate his righteousness because in the forbearance of god, he passed over the sins previously committed. The old way was to pass over. The word there is to place on the side or to disregard and the word that's used here now is to take away on all sides.

11:59 It's to lift up. It's to take entirely out of the way. Instead of pushing it to the side and it's still here, it's been lifted away. It's been removed. It's been taken away.

12:17 Verse 11. This next section from verse 11 through 18 is another little subsection that talks about the the job of the priests, the ironic priest, the priest after the order of Aaron, and the job of the lord Jesus Christ as priest. The old priests stand at their position daily, all day, every day. They stand offering these sacrifices that can never take away sin. Their job was never done.

13:01 Never done. The old priests stand daily. And he having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time sat down. Christ having made one sacrifice is forever seated in comparison. One time, no sacrifices left, none is needed ever.

13:28 Those who accept this sacrifice are perfected forever. We have a perfect standing as born again regenerate Christians who are children of God. We have a perfect standing before God who accepts us as he accepts his son. We are children of God. We are joint heirs with Christ.

13:55 We have an equal standing. We have been... This this is this is the most incredible promotion you could ever have. You're you're you're going from the very very bottom of the ladder to the very very top of the ladder. This is our standing.

14:18 And we can have a perfect conscience in the sense that our the penalty for our sin has been forever paid. God will not demand any further payment. Because it's done. He has sat down. He doesn't have any other work to do.

14:37 It is that complete. And the Holy Spirit is a witness through the Old Testament to this. So in verse 16, this is a quote from Jeremiah 31. This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days. I will put my laws upon their heart and upon their mind I will write them.

14:57 Their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more. There's no further payment. There's no offering that exists for something that has been already paid and forgiven. You buy a car and you finance that car and you have a loan on that car and you make your payments and eventually one day, hopefully not after too many years, you've paid off this car and you make that final payment and the debt is forgiven and the bank gets to send you the title to the car because now you own it. And how would the conversation go if you call up the bank and go, I just want to make a payment to make sure that I get to keep it mine, maybe once a year, I send you money?

15:52 They'd look at you like you were crazy, but this is can't, there's no offering, can't make any other payment for something that's been satisfied. It's over permanently and forever. So here's the new way, verse 19. Therefore, brethren, we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus by a new and living way, which he inaugurated for us through the veil, that is his flesh. And since we have a great high priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.

16:36 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful, and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another and all the more as you see the day drawing near. So now that we've talked about what the old covenant was and what it wasn't, and what the old sacrifice was and what it wasn't, and what Christ sacrifice is. Where are we now? Where the old covenant required distance, the new one doesn't. There's no fear of condemnation.

17:27 There are no human mediators, there are no barriers. We have confidence to enter the holy place. That makes us priests. The holy place was for the priests, and the most holy place was just for the high priest and just once a year. We're all priests.

17:51 There is no human mediator between us and God any longer. We have the direct access. We don't go to God through the elders or through some other higher religious authority or person. We have the direct access. This is a new way.

18:18 The veil symbolic of Christ's body, not his sinless life, but his death. The veil has been removed. The veil was torn and is now removed and gives us access. And he is now Jesus Christ is now our high priest, which ensures our full acceptance by the father. It ensures our full acceptance, it assures our full acceptance, and it ensures our full acceptance.

18:59 This is our our new covenant privilege. And he mentions a a pure heart here, a sincere heart verse 22. One of god's I wouldn't say one of his biggest gripes because I don't want to speak for him but one of his his gripes with Israel was that their heart wasn't in it. And that's still an issue today. Because we all we all deal with this.

19:35 Since the new way, the new covenant does not depend at all on anything that we do. Why do we go through the motions? And I say that guilty as charged, That you coming here today doesn't have anything to do with it doesn't have anything to do with with your salvation, with with with maintaining your salvation of course and it it has you're coming here in obedience to him, we should be coming here with a sincere heart because this is what we want to do. We want to set aside this time for God every week. This is about Him ultimately.

20:25 We have the breaking of bread where we specifically focus even out of our Sunday, we specifically devote that time to the cross and Calvary. When we accept Christ, his blood is figuratively sprinkled. It was literally sprinkled in the Old Testament. But we get a figurative sprinkling and so we assume the value of his blood. Our bodies, verse 23, 22, our bodies washed with pure water.

21:19 Our bodies are our lives. Our our lives are washed with pure water. They're cleansed from the guilt of sin. They're cleansed from eternal damnation and eternal death. They're cleansed permanently.

21:39 But there's also the cleansing that happens continually in the life of a believer. Cleansed continually by the spirit. Maybe we could think of it this way, and bear with me, maybe this isn't the best illustration for it, but if you have some antique item, if something from the eighteenth century, some, I don't know, a piece of silverware or a sword or a gun, I don't know, some kind of antique something, right? And it's you find it somewhere and it's completely rusted over, corroded, and worthless. And Jesus Christ takes it, this worthless item and makes it brand new.

22:38 And then not just makes it brand new, but then puts it somewhere where it's temperature and humidity controlled and nothing will ever happen to it now. It's it's it will be forever protected and it can't it'll never be back to that state. But it gets dusty and so you have to take it out and you dust it once in a while And it's and it's cleansed continually but it's protected. It's completely protected from ever being rusted and corroded ever again. Because it's being cared for by God.

23:21 It's being nurtured by God. It's being cleansed continually by God through the work of the Holy Spirit. In verse 26, now we have a section that I think is so important that we get to since we've just talked about the significance of the new covenant and Christ sacrifice. Because now we get to this section that sounds like at first glance so we can lose our salvation. And for the same reason that the author put it here right after, and this is the very next argument, I want to make sure that we keep going and we finish this thought.

25:02 Since scripture cannot contradict itself. Start here. Okay, scripture cannot contradict itself, one. Two, anything that when you to stick with what you already know to be true. And since we've just spent 25 verses talking about the old and the new covenant, he's not now going to throw in after all of that.

25:45 Oh, yeah. By the way, if you sin willfully, can lose your salvation. This doesn't make any sense at all because then he wouldn't have needed to have the whole last 25 verses. He would have just said, you're saved. But you could lose it.

26:05 It would have changed the whole last 25 verses. So, if that's not possible, if if we start with saying the argument is that you cannot lose your salvation and Christ's work is complete. Then who are we? What is this talking about? It's talking about the false Christians.

26:30 If we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, this is someone who has heard the gospel, who has participated, probably gone to church, someone who knows scripture, who knows the gospel, but has never actually professed Christ. But now having all of this knowledge of the new way of God's sacrifice, having all of this knowledge and then making a decision to cast it aside and willfully turn away and reject it. And it's even you kind of get the sense from here that it was even that there's angst here, trampled underfoot, insulted the spirit of grace. This isn't a Christian who messed up. We all mess up, right?

27:38 So this isn't a Christian who sinned, do they need to ask forgiveness for that sin? Of course they do. And if we confess our sins, He will forgive us our sins. This is the spirit's continual cleansing in the life of the believer. So we can't lose our salvation, but to the one who has been given a great privilege, someone who has heard and has seen the knowledge of the gospel, but has willfully rejected it.

28:08 This is the one for whom there's nothing left. If you reject God, you reject Christ sacrifice, then there is no further offering for sin. To finish out this chapter, and I know I'm at, no, not, I got five minutes. Yes, six. Alright.

28:44 Okay, I got six more minutes. I'm going keep going on. Wait, I'm going to backpedal a little, backpedal. So, I had I had a couple references for this and so I want to read them. So, just even back in Hebrews seven twenty five, the writer said this, hence also, he is able to save forever.

29:02 Those who draw near to god through him since he always lives to make intercession for them. I just wanted to give you a couple of other references to check to further prove my point. Romans eight thirty eight, and I could give you a paraphrase of this, but I'd rather not. For I am convinced that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor things present nor things to come nor powers nor height nor depth nor any other created thing. That would include yourself.

29:42 That includes Satan, that includes yourself. Nothing shall be able to separate us from the love of god which is in Christ Jesus, our lord. John ten twenty eight and twenty nine and this I will paraphrase. This is the the good shepherd and these are my sheep and I know them and no one shall snatch them out of my hand. Our salvation, our assurance of eternal life and acceptance by god are complete, perfect, and absolute.

31:00 For you showed sympathy to the prisoners and accepted joyfully the seizure of your property, knowing that you have for yourselves a better possession and an abiding one. Therefore do not throw away your confidence which has a great reward, for you have need of endurance so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what was promised. For yet, in a very little while, he who is coming will come and will not delay, but my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him. But we are not of those who shrink back to destruction, but of those who have faith to the preserving of the soul. There's an exhortation here now to endure.

31:53 This is our standing. This is where we are today. This is our position in Christ. And so now, as we live our lives, and God works through His sanctifying process of making us more like His Son. It's God's process and it's a painful one.

32:18 It's a painful process. The refining of gold through the fire as as we are being refined. As we are tested by fire, we are called to endure. Remember when you were first saved. This is what he's he's...

32:34 Remember the former days when after being enlightened. Remember when you were first saved. So remember that. Remember remember what you've been through already? Remember what God has brought you through?

32:46 Remember what God has done for you? Remember that. So don't give up now. Endure, Do not throw away your confidence which has a great reward for you have need of endurance. And the just will live by faith.

33:14 He's calling us to this life of of patience and perseverance. There's a principle There's a principle which characterizes the strength of our new life though. In the midst of our difficulties in the Christian life, the just shall live by faith. The author describes the action of our faith and is encouraging us to keep walking in this principle, to keep walking in this way, to keep the knowledge of of what Christ has done and the ultimate perfection of it. And keep a reminder of your standing.

34:14 So, as you go, as you go, and as you endure, and as you live through god's refining we can live by faith. We are those who have faith to the preserving of the soul. Let's close. Dear heavenly father, once more, we come to you and we thank you for your word. We thank you for you.

35:11 We confess it is it is easy to forget. We often forget. We forget our first love. We forget what you have done for us in the midst of our trials. Lord, it is hard but we know that you have given us the power.

35:28 You have given us the Holy Spirit that we can accomplish all things through you. We thank you for the power that we have. We thank you for the life that we can now live, and we ask for your help. We ask for your help as we ever seek to conform to the image of the lord Jesus Christ. We ask for your blessing upon us as we go now today.

35:56 In the lord Jesus name we pray. Amen.