Hebrews 10:1-4,
1 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.
2 Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, because the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have had consciousness of sins?
3 But in those sacrifices there is a reminder of sins year by year.
4 For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.
The Law made no one perfect, for if it did, they would not have sacrificed every year. Instead, in those sacrifices no one was cleansed, so they repeated the sacrifices every year.
The writer goes on,
5 Therefore, when He comes into the world, He says,
“SACRIFICE AND OFFERING THOU HAST NOT DESIRED,
BUT A BODY THOU HAST PREPARED FOR ME;
6 IN WHOLE BURNT OFFERINGS AND sacrifices FOR SIN THOU HAST TAKEN NO PLEASURE.
7 “THEN I SAID, ‘BEHOLD, I HAVE COME
(IN THE ROLL OF THE BOOK IT IS WRITTEN OF ME)
TO DO THY WILL, O GOD.’”
Now the writer explains the previous verses:
8 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),
9 then He said, “BEHOLD, I HAVE COME TO DO THY WILL.” He takes away the first in order to establish the second.
10 By this will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
11 And every priest stands daily ministering and offering time after time the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins;
12 but He, having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, SAT DOWN AT THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD,
13 waiting from that time onward UNTIL HIS ENEMIES BE MADE A FOOTSTOOL FOR HIS FEET.
14 For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified.
15 And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us; for after saying,
16 “THIS IS THE COVENANT THAT I WILL MAKE WITH THEM
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,
17 “AND THEIR SINS AND THEIR LAWLESS DEEDS
I WILL REMEMBER NO MORE.”
18 Now where there is forgiveness of these things, there is no longer any offering for sin.
The blood of bulls and goats could not take away sins, so Jesus said,
“THEN I SAID, ‘BEHOLD, I HAVE COME
(IN THE ROLL OF THE BOOK IT IS WRITTEN OF ME)
TO DO THY WILL, O GOD.’”
Jesus came to earth and did the will of God, and offered Himself up for us, the sinners. John said in 1 John 3:5, “And you know that He appeared in order to take away sins; and in Him there is no sin.”
How did Jesus take away sins? Was His blood more powerful than the blood of animals? Remember, the blood of animals could not take away sins. Does this mean the blood Jesus shed was greater than the blood animals shed? Of course, it is, but is it His blood that takes away sins?
The blood of animals had to be shed every year, whereas the blood of Jesus was shed only once, in one sacrifice. He did not need to come back every year and shed more blood to atone for more sins, nor did more animals need to be sacrificed.
The blood of animals did nothing but appease God. Once sins were atoned for, the people went right back into sin. And rather than destroy the entire nation, God allowed them to use the blood of animals every year to present as sacrifices for their sins. Again, they always went right back to sin. The blood of animals could not take away sin.
After saying, “Now where there is forgiveness of these things, there is no longer any offering for sin,” the writer of Hebrews continues:
19 Since therefore, brethren, we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus,
20 by a new and living way which He inaugurated for us through the veil, that is, His flesh,
21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God,
22 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.
23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful;
24 and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds,
25 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.
26 For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,
27 but a certain terrifying expectation of judgment, and THE FURY OF A FIRE WHICH WILL CONSUME THE ADVERSARIES.
The difference between the sacrifice of bulls and goats and the blood of Jesus is that our hearts were sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. How did this happen? It happened by us being crucified with Him and buried with Him and raised up with Him into heavenly places, where our new lives are now hidden with Him in God.
The only thing the sacrifice of Jesus did to our sinful bodies of flesh was to kill them. We have died to the Law, to the world, and to sin. Our sinful bodies were buried with the body of Jesus. And a new creation came into being, the body of the living Christ, the church, of which we are all members. And now live and walk by faith in heavenly places where our lives are.
(When I say our sinful bodies, I am speaking of the flesh which wars against the Spirit because of the sin that dwells in us. We are told to consider ourselves dead to sin and alive to God through faith in Jesus).
Our heavenly Father now disciplines us in order that we might learn obedience. He provides a way of escape from every temptation common to man, but He allows us to go through struggle after struggle, for the testing of our faith produces endurance. He does not tempt us; we are only tempted when we are carried away and enticed by our own lust.
It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons, Hebrews 12:7-8.
This, my friends, is why Jesus doesn’t have to shed His blood every year; through Him, God has made us new creatures who live and walk in and by the Spirit; disciplined creatures who worship and serve the Father and Son in reverence and truth.
Jesus has taken away sins by giving us a new beginning in the Spirit, in order that we might be free from the slavery to sin, and alive to the righteousness of God.
“…knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, that our body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin,” Romans 6:6-7.
“Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body that you should obey its lusts, and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law, but under grace,” Romans 6:11-14.
To the one true God be glory and honor and power and authority before time and now and forever,
Jon David Banks, God’s most unworthy servant
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. www.lockman.org
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