Hebrews 9 A New Worship Based on a New Covenant

The speaker discusses the significance of Hebrews chapter nine, likening it to reaching the top of a mountain. The chapter explains Christ's sacrifice and role as a high priest in the heavenly tabernacle, contrasting with the limitations of the old covenant. Details of the old tabernacle are described, highlighting how Christ fulfilled the expectations of the old covenant through his sacrifice. The new covenant allows all believers to enter the Holy of Holies, making all of life sacred. Well, good morning. I see we've got a lot of folks visiting relatives this morning. That's good. By the way, Carol Ann was not feeling well this morning. She's okay, but she, she never complains about anything. But when she does like she did this morning, I can't go. I don't question it. I just say we'll stay home then. So she, she just wasn't up to it this morning. But we're glad to be here and glad you're here. Now when we come to the Hebrews chapter nine, we really come to, it's like climbing a mountain. When we get to chapter nine in the book of Hebrews, we've reached the top of the mountain. Uh, this is, this is the chapter that tells us, uh, what happened when Christ died on the cross, when he was resurrected, when he, he went, went into the high, high, as a high priest in the heavenly tabernacle, not the earthly tabernacle, which is like, uh, it's almost like we, we feel like when we look at this, that we're standing on holy ground. I mean, this is that which is inexplicable. We can't comprehend this. And yet we know it's true. He did not enter into the earthly tabernacle, but the heavenly tabernacle. And in, in this chapter, it reminds us that the, the blood of, of goats and, uh, and bulls cannot, uh, cannot resolve the sin problem. They'd be sufficient for the earthly tabernacle, but the real need is for the removal of our sins. And that had to take place in eternity in the heavenly, heavenly tabernacle. So, um, we, we actually are seeing in this chapter, uh, a, a, uh, a combination of the great difference between the two covenants, the old covenant and the new covenant. And the first five verses of this chapter are unique to the old, to the, to the new Testament because they describe the tabernacle. And, uh, we could spend a lot of time going into that, but the, he begins chapter nine by, by, by contrasting the limitations of the old covenant with the blessings of the new covenant. And, uh, and before he gets into that, it's, it's, it's like he said, I will, I will just step back and think about the tabernacle again. It was sort of a reflection. Uh, it was a retrospect of the old tabernacle. Uh, and it describes the, uh, the various parts of the, of the old tabernacle. Uh, tabernacle was set up the first room, which is called the holy place, the lamp stands, the table, the presentation loaves behind the second curtain, uh, was a tent called the holy place, gold altar, incense, the ark of the covenant with the gold on all sides and which are gold. And it tells you what was in the ark of covenant. And, uh, it is, it's just, it's just like, he's thinking back and remember the cow chewing his cud. He just kind of reminiscing and thinking how really special that was. And, uh, it's special for us because the, the old, old tabernacle, the old covenant pointed toward the new covenant. Christ is fulfillment of it all. That's the message of Hebrews. And, uh, and we find the description of that throughout this ninth chapter, but we begin by looking at the, uh, just looking back at the earthly tabernacle and, uh, we'll not, uh, no need to really go into any of the detail of that, but it might be interesting for you to know that the holy, the holy place in the temple was two thirds of the temple, two thirds of the temple. And, uh, the, the, uh, the, the temple was not huge, but it was big about 50 yards by maybe 15, 20 yards, pretty good sized place. And, uh, the, uh, the first five verses just talked to us about the golden lamps, lamp stand and the table of the showbread and two rows of loaves and all things that happened in that old tabernacle. And the, the ark of the covenant was in the holiest place and was the most sacred of all the furniture in the tabernacle. In the ark of the covenant, they, uh, they had a, I tried to figure out how to, how to say it. I first said they had a copy of the 10 commandments and the scripture here says they had a, had a tablet of the 10 commandments. So I'm not really sure exactly what it was, but they, they had the 10 commandments there in the, uh, uh, ark of the covenant, Aaron's rod, which budded and they had a gold. Now this is amazing. A gold container of manna from the wilderness that was still good. Unlike the man in the wilderness, you remember if you didn't gather it the day that it was there and you tried to get enough for two days after the first day, it, it purified, uh, putrefied. This, this, this, this didn't do that. This is in the, in there is some of the manna from, uh, that God had provided for them, uh, in the wilderness. And it's in that most sacred place, um, that, that, uh, is the holy of holies of heaven that represented the one of heaven that Jesus went to that we read about as we get a little bit later in here, he starts out the talking about the limitations of the old covenant. Uh, they are a whole list of them that, uh, that I would, uh, uh, just quickly limit, uh, mention to limitation of location. They only served in one place, a limitation of human inability to bring about anything eternal. There was a limitation of, of, of, of no, no, no finality, no permanence. They had to continue offering sacrifices day by day. The high priest was there with a limitation of representation. He was only one man, but he was the only one who could do what needed to be done once a year in the holy of holies. There was a limitation of occasion. Only one priest could do, uh, to do the most significant sacrifice of all as described in Leviticus 16. Also a limitation of prior, uh, the, the, the, the priest couldn't be a novice, uh, had to be someone who was a veteran. And so the limitation to who could do this, the limitation of the offering of bulls and goats and on and on, uh, and the holy spirit was guiding, indicating through all of this that the, that the entire system of sacrifice in the old covenant was, was gone. It, it, it, it, it now needed to be replaced. And that's what Christ, uh, had come to do. Christ then became through his sacrifice and through serving as our high priest, uh, he became the mediator of the new covenant. And when you come to, uh, uh, verse 11, let me just, let me just read this for, uh, for us. But Christ has appeared as a high priest of good things that have come in the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands that is not of this creation. He entered the most holy place once for all time, not by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption. For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a young cow, sprinkling those who are, uh, who are defiled, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ who through the eternal spirit offered himself without blemish to God, cleanse our consciousness from dead work so that we can serve the living God. That is, that is, that is the climax of the peak of the book of Hebrews for Christ accomplished for us when he went into the heavenly holy of holies. And, uh, we ought never to take that for granted. This is an amazing thing. And, and, uh, you almost feel like, uh, uh, when Moses saw the burning bush and the first thing that Lord told him was take your shoes off. This is, this is holy ground. When we come to this, we're really at holy ground in the book of Hebrews, but we are now, we are now with Christ in the heavenlies and we are now, uh, recipients of his sacrifice. And, uh, uh, there's so many, so many things that reveal the superiority of Christ over the old covenant. He himself, uh, was not a man, was not, not, not human in that he had, had no end. He's eternal. Uh, he, he is, he is one who, who went, went by himself and where the heavenly, where the earthly priest had to, had to offer every day and once a year for, for the, for Yom Kippur, uh, Christ just did one time says once for all, that's kind of a, in this, in this chapter, that's kind of the, uh, uh, the, the punchline, if you please, that once for all, what was done many times by the priest, Christ did once for all. So there is an emphasis now that the old covenant pointed toward the new covenant and the book of Hebrews is telling us that Christ fulfilled all of the old Testament. Um, it's, it's kinda interesting that, uh, uh, Carol Ann and I had, uh, uh, had the opportunity to, to have a Easter Seder meal, uh, with a good Jewish family in, in Dallas while we were here in Julius. I had taken a group of Baptist pastors and Jewish rabbis to the Holy Land back in 1983. And the, uh, Jewish Anti-Defamation League is, uh, at that time was, uh, led by a man named Mark Briskman who lived in Dallas. He was Jewish and in charge of the Jewish Defamation League and they were responsible for the trip, uh, that we went on. And, uh, so when we came back, he said, we want y'all to have, have a Seder meal with us. So what was interesting was to realize everything in the Seder meal pointed exactly to Jesus Christ. I mean, every, everything that, that the Jews still meet and celebrate without realizing that it actually describes Jesus Christ. The tabernacle is the same way, the old covenant the same way. Everything in the old covenant pointed to the, to Jesus Christ and he fulfilled it. And what we're reading now in, in chapter nine here, we're seeing how, how Jesus himself fulfills the, the expectations of the anticipations of the old covenant. There's now a new covenant. In the old covenant, only the high priest could enter the Holy of Holies and he could do it only once a year. In the new covenant through Christ, every one of us can enter into the Holy of Holies. There is now not just one man, but all, every believer now has the opportunity to enter into the holiest place because of what Jesus Christ did on the, on the cross. And that makes all of life sacred for us. I said it before, but we need to be reminded often that for the believer, nothing in life is secular. All of life is sacred. And, and the death of Christ on the cross fulfilled all of the anticipations of the old covenant. And now then there's not just one man once a year who could enter into the holiest place where God dwells himself, but every believer now is invited to have unhindered access into the very presence of God. That's an amazing thing that happens when we get, well, never to get over it. You know, the sad thing about many of us is we got over getting saved. We're so used to it. We, we take it for granted. That's not a good thing. Never take anything for granted. When you take something for granted, you're soon going to lose it. And you'll begin drifting. And I reminded you before, you never drift anywhere worth going. You never drift anywhere worth going. When we come to the book of Hebrews, we're seeing a specific way of gaining access to God. We don't drift there. We intentionally go there and by the, by our faith, that's the key to it all. We're able to move into the heavenly places with Jesus Christ himself. Verse 11 reminds us that Christ is now the mediator of the, of the new covenant, which is kind of an interesting thing because Christ, Christ is actually, as the high priest is going to execute his own, his own will. He is going to be the executor of his own estate. He's, he is, is going to, to open the door completely into the presence of God. And he fulfills his role that took place in the heavenly places and with the not with the, with the earthly tabernacle, but with the perfect tabernacle with God, face to face with God. There's a finality about it. He did it once for all. So this, this gives us superior access to God. Christ's sacrifice on the cross opened the door for everyone to have access to God. Now just pause long enough to think, do we really take advantage of that? Do you realize that you have today full access into the presence of the creator of the universe? Why don't you exercise it? Why, why do you act like it never happened? I've had, I've been blessed in my life to meet some important people around the world, princes and prime ministers and presidents. And you don't just casually meet with those folks. You prepare for it and you make sure you look nice and you try to, try to behave yourself. I only violated that one time. I was meeting with Yitzhak Shamir, who was the prime minister of Israel. And I was due to meet him at 10 o'clock in the morning at his office in the Knesset. And that night before that meeting, his coalition fell apart. Now in Israel, they have a parliament and they have to combine parties in order for somebody to be in command. So the prime minister has to have a coalition of various groups of Jews who don't always get along in order for him to remain prime minister. So his coalition fell apart the night before we were going to meet. Well, Dave Meyer, some of you know Dave Meyer, was with me on the trip and we left the hotel about eight o'clock in the morning. After I left, Shamir's office called the hotel to tell me not to come because he was in the process of putting, trying to put a coalition together so he could still be prime minister. It was broadcast on the radio. We took a taxi cab to the Knesset about 9 or 9.15, 9.30, like that. We didn't know we were supposed to come. And they're brought, we're listening on the radio to what's happening with Shamir. He's now meeting with his, you know, inner circle. They're meeting with the other groups. They're trying to tell him everything's going on. And we got there and got out and we told the taxi driver, now you stay here. So he stayed and he listened. He's listening to all this on the radio. After a while, he said, they came over there and said, well, he has left his meeting with his team to negotiate a new coalition to meet some guests in his office. Well, that was us. So I have a picture of me sitting about this far from Shamir. And I don't know why I said it, but I looked at him and I said, he's never seen me before. He does not even know who I am. And I said, looks like you need a Gatorade break. He looked at me like, who are you and what is Gatorade? So I violated my own policy. You know, don't be casual with important people when you meet with them. But listen, every one of us have access to the most important person in the world. Access to God. You have open doors to him. You don't have to knock, you can just go in. When Christ died on the cross, he opened the door for access to the actual presence of God for all believers. What an amazing thing. That's where we are in the ninth chapter. And it's a wonderful reminder to us that eternity is now a completed fact. Heaven is real because Christ has come. By faith, we can embrace the future now. The promises of God are already an accomplished fact. They're future for us and we secure them by faith. We, by faith, can already secure the blessings of eternity. That's the difference Christ makes. And what a wonderful opportunity that is for all of us to live in the very presence of God. The human high priest entered into the Holy of Holy once a year. In vivid contrast, Christ died and entered once for all times. And because of his death, he is the mediator for the new covenant. And he establishes a new relationship between God and man that leads to unhindered access. The new covenant, interestingly enough, is retroactive. Now, we need to think about that for a moment. Romans 3.25 says, God presented him, Christ, as an atoning sacrifice in his blood, received through faith to demonstrate his righteousness because in his restraint, God passed over the sins previously committed. Oh, actually, people were saved before the cross on credit. They had faith in what was about to happen. And it was like that they were on credit, so to speak. They were waiting, dependent upon the great sacrifice that hadn't come yet, but they believed it would. And they trusted him. And when he died on the cross, he fulfilled all the promises. And all the past sins had been committed forever before that time were covered in the cross. You know, when you come to Easter, we love to either hear Brother Jack or Brother John or me, we'll talk about the telestai when we come to Easter. That's what Jesus cried on the cross. It means it is finished. It is finished. When he died on the cross, everything that was needed for our provision to have a relationship with God was finished. It was done. There's nothing else for us to do. It's already been done. And so Hebrews 9 is just reminding us of what took place. Christ went into the heavenly tabernacle, negotiated, administered all of the sacrifice and made effective as our mediator, our access into God. There's actually, in verses 16 and 17, there's a play on the words between covenant and will. Actually, the same Greek word is translated both. And obviously for a will to be probated, someone has to die. And in his death on the cross, Jesus sealed the covenant in a way that the old covenant was never sealed. He sealed it with his own blood. He went beyond that, even in an astonishing way. He became the executor of his own estate, of his own will. It's through him that we receive the blessings of access to God. So the validity of the new covenant took care of all of those who are in heaven on credit and all of those of us who followed from there. The value of the old covenant is cherished through this chapter because it was an anticipation of the new covenant that still required a blood sacrifice. Now, blood represents life. It's the most precious substance possible. That just is a reminder that forgiveness is not cheap. It's costly. The old covenant relationship was inaugurated by blood, according to verses 19 and 20. The old covenant place of worship was inaugurated by blood, according to verse 21. In a dramatic scene, Moses sprinkled the people and the vessels and the worship place with blood, verses 19 and 20. As the crimson flow of blood spotted the people and the implements, it sealed the covenant. The old covenant in its entirety represented access to God and that is what happened when Jesus died on the cross. The position of the words, in blood, is significant. In the Greek language, the most important emphasis of any sentence is at the first. So, it's a little different. We can do a lot of words before we mention the most important word. In the Greek language, the closer it is to the first of the sentence, the more important it is. The phrase that in blood is pushed right up to the front, to the first of this verse. It is the blood of Christ that gives the power of a pure life and that purifies others. The Greek actually says that it is foreign. It is impossible for there to be remission of sins without shedding the outpouring of blood. Now, by the way, neither of these ideas is complete by itself. The pouring out of the blood of the victim is one thing. The application of blood at the altar, they are both necessary. The Greek further says that there is no release. There is no release. And this phrase is a noun that is without precedent in the New Testament. He is saying that without the pouring of blood, there can be no release from sin. Without the shedding of blood, it is impossible. And by the way, the word is larger than just the idea of forgiveness. It indicates that it goes beyond the idea of the total release from the effects of sin. There is indeed power in the blood. The blood frees us from the control and the ultimate consequences of sins. Some of you will know the name of Dr. Earl Allen. Dr. Earl Allen was pastor of the Rosen Heights Baptist Church in Fort Worth for 34 years. He had a huge library. One thing, he would invite us preachers from time to time to come into his library and then if we saw something we wanted, he would give us a book. Quite an interesting man, great preacher. At a sweetheart banquet, he recounts the story of a teenager serving the dessert to the people who accidentally spilled a cherry pie on his new white coat. And the girl was mortified. Dr. Allen tried to assure that it was okay, probably would come out, though he really doubted it would. And he took it to the cleaners the next day and asked the cleaner if the stain could be removed. Dr. Allen said that the cleaner told him, we can remove it so that no one else can see it except you. Because you know that it's there, you will always be able to see a faint trace of the outline of the stain. No one else will be able to see it, but you will. Now, that's not total cleaning. It may be adequate for a dinner jacket, but it's not adequate for sin. We need a total cleansing from sin. It needs to be removed. It deals not only with what others see, but what we see ourselves. Only the blood of Jesus Christ can do that. Now, you just think about it. He who knew no sin became sin for us so that we who knew no righteousness could become righteous because of him. Amazing. When he looks at us, he doesn't see our sin anymore. We're clean. We've been purified. We've been saved. The cross of Christ was the most significant, important, powerful moment in the history of mankind, and we must not take it lightly. That's why there's so much emphasis in Hebrews about the significance of what happened at Calvary. That's why, as I will talk to you about next week, the Bride of Hebrews talks about what I consider to be the sin unto death and the fact that the sin unto death is horrible because it re-crucifies Christ again, exposing him to shame and to the pain of the cross again. It's unthinkable that we would want to put Christ through all of this again. The importance of the forgiveness of sin. Do you realize we have a friend of many years whose wife remembers here when we were here years ago, but she could never get confidence in her salvation. I mean, I can't tell you how many times we sat down to talk to her about assurance of salvation. She just struggled and struggled with the assurance of salvation and never could quite reach it. Well, God wants us to have assurance of our salvation, and we're not saved and we're not to have salvation because of anything we do. Now, it's in us to want to do something. We all want to help God out if we can, but there's nothing we can do. Sometimes, I told you this before, I was preaching in Bonn, Germany through an interpreter. I don't know why I did this. I hadn't planned to, but I held up a German $10 bill and asked how many of you would like to have this? Well, you know, hands went up everywhere. So, a lady on the front row, hands went up everywhere. So, a lady on the front row, I just pointed to her and said, here, come get it. She came and she took it, and then she stepped back and stopped, and then she handed it back to me. I said, oh no, I gave that to you. It's yours. You can have it. I don't need it back. I've given it to you. Now, I use it as an illustration for all of us. What do you have to do to be saved? Just receive it. She didn't do anything to get that 10 mark. She just received it. She just accepted it. Salvation is there for anyone who will receive it, but there is such an inbred sense of sin in our lives that we're going to refuse many times to do what is really best for us, but when Christ died on that cross, everything that needed to be done was done, nothing else. You didn't do anything to get it. You didn't deserve it. You didn't buy it. You didn't be good for it. You didn't learn catechism for it or memorize scripture for it. You just accepted it, and God said, then you're saved. Take it. It's offered to you. You say, how do I do that? By faith. By faith. Believe God. Trust God. Well, that's what Hebrews is all about, and this is really the most promising point in Hebrews is in this chapter. The supreme sacrifice has been made. The triumphant conclusion is that the Messiah has come. He is before you, and he has paid the price for us. High top of a Chicago temple, there's a small cross hanging over the city of Chicago. It's said to be the highest cross in the world, higher than any other house of worship anywhere in the world. Great crowds pass back and forth. I went to Chicago back in the 1950s and did a revival meeting for my college classmate in a little church in Chicago. Loved Chicago, but it's a difficult city, and it's multiple cities within a city. There is a Polish section, and there's a Hispanic section, and there are little cities within the city of Chicago. Because of that, it's difficult for them to manage. Chicago is a very violent city. Dozens of people would be killed every weekend, murdered in Chicago still. I like Chicago. My college roommate worked at a clothing store in downtown Chicago, so every day I would go down, ride the city bus down to the Loop. Don't have time to explain it if you don't know what that is, but anyway, downtown is really called the Loop because of the high rail transportation that is above the streets. Anyway, and I just walk around the Loop. Fascinating. I remember going to a Methodist church in downtown Chicago that had an organ concert every day at noon. Down there, I would listen, you know, sit in on that organ concert. Quite a city. High above the city, there's this building with a cross, and the people, you know, don't pay any attention to it. Yet one day, everybody stopped to look up because it looked like there was a man hanging on the cross, and a workman had been commissioned to clean the cross. And so, from beneath the street, it appeared like the man was hanging on the cross. But the empty cross has no power to change people's direction. When a man was on the cross, it stopped people on the street, and they looked up, but nothing changed. But our great high priest hung on the cross. For six hours, he hung on the cross, and the whole world changed. He offered a better sacrifice in a heavenly tabernacle with a superior result. No one can avoid, evade, or look around at what happened on that cross. Herschel Hobbs, pastor at First Baptist, Oklahoma City, many years, dear friend, you wrote more for the Sunday School Board, more materials than any other author we ever had, but he noticed that the cross itself looks like a plus sign. So, he says it's God's plus sign, and it's the better thing that God did. That's what happened on Calvary. He died once for us. Never happened before. Will never happen again. And the final sentence in this chapter, verses 27 and 28, the key word is the word once. Men are appointed once to die. Now, just think about that. My dad used to, I've told you this before, but I believe it. I may die in an accident, but I will never die accidentally. But I will die. We all do. We're all terminal. It's not a question of if, it's when. And that we don't know. We don't know when. But we know we're appointed to die once. Hebrews has been talking about the fact that Christ only died once. He only made one sacrifice. The Jewish high priest had to repeat his sacrifice. Jesus didn't, just one time. That tells us there's only one physical death. We live once, and all believers will just die once. There's no replace for life. When we finish this life, one time is all we get. No opportunity to run it through again. Just as we have only one life, God desires that we only have one death. Unbelievers will live once and die twice. They will be destined in eternal separation from God. That's the second death. But believers, God only intended for us to die one time, through faith in Christ. We don't have to die twice. If anyone dies, now listen carefully, if anyone dies twice, it's by their own choice. God sends nobody to hell. God never intended for us to die twice. The cross is the message of God, of his love, and his presentation of grace to us, so that we will not die twice. Oh, and Hebrews also reminds us, because Christ was raised from the dead, he'll come back. He'll come back. And look at that last verse, the last two verses. Just as it is appointed for people to die once and after this judgment, so also Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him. That's the way the chapter concludes. The details of the day of atonement, the tabernacle, are the forerunner of the second coming of Christ. On that day, the high priest went into the Holy of Holies to sacrifice for his own sins, and then for the sins of the people. It was a breathtaking moment for the people. They stood outside the temple, watching with great expectation, because if the high priest didn't perform his duties in the Holy of Holies, he would be killed. Which is why some say that the Jews would tie a rope around the ankle of the high priest just in case, because if God killed him, they wanted to be able to drag him out. Nobody else could go in. So this Christ that died on that cross is the assurance and the confidence we have that we do not have to die twice. God's message is that he doesn't want any to perish, but all to come to repentance. And the chapter concludes with a wonderful reminder of the second coming of Christ. When the people saw the high priest coming out from the temple on that day, they were satisfied that the sacrifice had been made and the sins had been forgiven. And the truth is, when our Christ returns as our great high priest, we will know that we've been saved from the penalty of sin, we belong to him, and we will be with him for eternity. In that magnificent day when he returns, we'll be like him, we will see him as he is, we will share his glory, and so shall we ever be with the Lord. That's the message of Hebrews in the high point here in chapter 9. Incredible. But every ritual of the Old Covenant was a forerunner pointing to the coming of Christ. Every high priest who entered once a year to offer for the sins of himself and the nation, now Jesus Christ has made that sacrifice for us, all of us, and we can receive him by faith. In Christ, we have the future now. In Christ, we taste heaven now. Our fellowship together is a little taste of what heaven is going to be like, and whether you're in this part of the world or that. I remember being in Argentina way back 50 years ago, preaching at a church, and a young man came forward and received Christ probably in his early 20s, and he came back and he gave me a big abrazo, a big old hug, and he pushed me back and he said, one day, one day, you will see me in heaven, and I will greet you with a hug because of what Christ has done. Don't ever take that for granted, and you can understand why Hebrews talks about, as we're going to see next week, if you disregard the sacred things of God, if you consider the sacrifice of Christ as nothing, you ignore it, you take it for granted, you don't value it. It's a dangerous thing for a sinner to fall into the hands of God. Great reminder. In Christ, we have part of eternity now, and the assurance of eternity to come, and don't ever get over that. Don't ever get over that. Father, thank you for what Christ did, and we cannot even imagine it. We don't know crucifixions. We've not seen crucifixions. We've read about it. We know what a cruel part of death it is to die by crucifixion. We can't really imagine what Christ did, but he did it for us, and he asked us just to trust him. God, help us to live life trusting you because you're trustworthy. You entered once for all. We are saved today, tomorrow, and forever because of your sacrifice, and we thank you in Jesus' name. Amen.