The Blood of Jesus | Ps. Keith Pittman

Welcome to the Celebration Church Orlando podcast.

Thank you so much for listening today.

We hope it encourages you and inspires you.

Here's today's message.

How many of us want to hear more of Nate singing some Earth Winning Fire songs?

I think that'll be that'll be a vibe, man.

That's what I'm I'm looking forward to.

That um I want to I want to just reinforce a couple of things that um that that he had mentioned just to kind of just add a level of um importance and and hopefulness that you guys will be able to participate in it.

The first being um Sisterhood this upcoming uh Friday for all the ladies in the house.

Um please consider just orienting your schedule to be there.

We don't have these um very often.

I think we only have them a couple of times uh this year, and this is our first one that we've had, I think since before the pandemic.

So it's just gonna be a great space for for the ladies in the house to come together, to be encouraged, to sharpen one another and community.

So um I think it's gonna be a powerful time.

So um looking hopefully that you can sacrifice and create some space for it.

Um but then in addition to that, the the celebration um at the park is just gonna be an amazing um opportunity and we're gonna still have service.

It'll still be worship, it'll still be a brief message, but it's gonna be in a setting that's gonna be out in the open.

Hopefully, we can invite some people.

We're also hoping that people will walk by and say, like, who are these people with their hands lifted up?

What's going on here?

And then hopefully through that, um, you'd just be amazed at how the gospel could impact people just in spaces like that.

So just be mindful about um who you could possibly bring with you, but let us show up in force and let us um just demonstrate the love of Jesus beyond just the four walls um of the church.

I believe it can truly be um encouragement for us.

And then lastly, um just again wanted to circle back to um the Jesus in the workplace discussion.

I think that all of us understand um our responsibility that Jesus isn't just for us, but it's also for others.

And and a lot of times when we think about the change we want to see in the world, it it starts with us and it starts with us living a life and letting our lights shine as Jesus calls it.

And so the varying spaces that God has put us in, instead of us just looking at it as a job, what if we began to view it as a kingdom assignment?

And and how do I demonstrate the love of Jesus with this kingdom assignment?

If I'm in a classroom, how do I demonstrate that?

And so we're hoping that we can come together and have a sharpening of ideas of how we can do this in a way that reaches people where they are with love and grace, but also an invitation for something so much greater.

So we have a lot of incredible things that are happening this month.

Um here at Celebration Um Orlando, inclusive of continuing in our Greater Than series.

Um, I'm so excited about this series because it really does kind of fit into just the way that my my mind works.

And and if you haven't been here the past couple of weeks, maybe you've missed certain parts of it.

Um, but but ultimately to summarize it, that this greater than series is us going through the book of Hebrews and really examining some of the theological themes that are in it.

See, for me, I'm a firm believer that um right thinking produces right behavior.

And and a lot of times when we become followers of Christ, we kind of get brought into an ecosystem where there's language that's used and phrases that we hear and behaviors that we're encouraged to have, but we don't understand the origin story of it.

We don't know why we do it, we just do it.

And certainly God responds to that.

But I also believe that when we understand why we do what we do, we understand the importance of it and why we exalt Jesus above all else, there's just something about our faith being anchored and knowing where this all has originated from.

And so that's really what this book is about.

That's what this series has been about.

It's been about us recalibrating our mindset to understand that Jesus truly is greater than everything else that the world has to offer.

Because if we're honest with ourselves, we're living in a world of so much customization, and we can take a little bit of this and a little bit of that.

We live in a world where there's so many opinions and options, and so when we begin to really think about what does it mean when we say Jesus, like think about that for a moment.

You know, we we started off this year with a series called The Way, that was just a calling of it.

And many of y'all came to us and said, Man, is that because of the Mandalorian?

No, even though I am excited about this new season.

Um, but no, that is not where the way comes from.

It actually comes from Acts chapter six, where it talks about how the earlier believers were referred to as the way.

Before they had the title Christian, they were referred to as the folks who were followers of the way because there was something unique about the way these people lived their lives.

They were living the ways of Jesus.

And so we wanted to continue in that momentum for this entire year by unpacking God's word and looking at the ways of Jesus and ultimately coming to the conclusion that it's my life, God's way, and our story collectively as a community.

And so we started off our year with that, and we're continuing the same theme of that for the rest of this year.

Um, last week, Pastor Nate preached an incredible message um talking about um the high priest and really what does that mean and why does it apply to us and how is Jesus our high priest and and and what's the significance of it?

And so if you missed last week, go back and check it out because I believe that this week really does serve as part too.

Because this week we're gonna be talking about the other side of the function of the high priest, and that is the sacrifice.

Um, so we have the high priest, but a high priest was only as valuable as the sacrifice that he offered before God, and so they work in tandem um with one another.

And so today we're gonna be talking about um the sacrifice that Christ has given to us as the church and ultimately why does it matter?

Um I almost called this part two to Pastor Nate's message, but uh, I want to specifically call this something that I think um we've heard in the church, and I want to try to provide as much explanation as humanly possible.

To give you some context as to where we are, um we're looking at a group of people that have been followers of Yahweh.

They've been followers of of God, and and and now that Jesus has come on the scene, it's it's begun to challenge and conflict with some of their traditions and some of their cultural nuances, and they're trying to figure out how how can I still follow Jesus but incorporate some of these other traditions and things into it?

Because if I can compromise a little bit, it'll help me to fit a little bit better into community.

It was this compromising approach, and so the writer of Hebrews wanted to come back and say, Let me let me help you to understand that when you are a follower of Jesus, this is what it means.

You don't have to go to these other expressions in order to be righteous in the eyes of God.

But the tension was this sacrificial system, which is what they were accustomed to.

This idea that offering sacrifices at the altar was how they drew closer to God.

But but he was trying to remind them that through Jesus, he was the ultimate sacrifice.

You don't have to do these things anymore, you have to receive it and walk it out.

That was the tension that they had to manage.

They were living a life of Jesus and the sacrifice, and he was trying to help them to understand no, through Jesus, he's finished it all.

You just need to walk it out and be obedient to it.

So looking here at Hebrews chapter number 10, starting at verse 14, with that concept in mind, here is what the writer is encouraging them with.

He says, For by one offering, he has perfected forever those who are sanctified.

In other words, we don't have to keep doing this over and over again.

The Holy Spirit also testifies about this, for after this he says, This is the covenant I will make with them after those days, the Lord says.

Now, where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer an offering for sin.

This may sound like a bunch of just wordplay that really doesn't have any much significance to us in our day-to-day lives, but what the writer is helping them to understand is that because of the perfect sacrifice of Christ, you don't have to keep coming and offering new sacrifices over and over again.

Jesus has already done it once and for all.

And when he died on the cross, it transcended time, which means that his death, it covers our past, present, and future sins.

It's not permission to live a sinful lifestyle, it's actually empowerment to live free in authority that God has given us.

Amen.

So today I want to talk to us a little bit around the subject of sacrifice, and I've entitled this message something simple, and some of my old school saints will appreciate this.

I called it this the blood of Jesus.

The blood of Jesus.

Anybody ever grew up in a household where they talked about the blood of Jesus?

Jasmine's over there rock saying, Mmm, yes, uh, the blood of Jesus.

Like you saw some of y'all understand what I'm talking about when I say the blood of Jesus.

We're gonna unpack that um in just a moment, but let's pray.

Lord, we thank you so much um for this incredible community.

We thank you for your word and for the opportunities that we have to come together, knowing that you are amongst us.

So, Father, I just pray over the next few moments um that you give us open eyes to see you, open ears to hear you, and open hearts to receive everything that you have for us.

Holy Spirit, you're welcome.

And we invite you, we we make room for you, and we ask that you um that you give us just a discernment to recognize what it is that your voice is speaking to us.

We ask that you challenge us, inspire us in Jesus' name.

Amen.

And amen.

Um, most of us are are probably familiar with the phrase um blood, sweat, and tears.

It's it's something that's a it's a it's a it's an idiom that that transcends any particular area of expertise.

It's something that we often will say that ultimately is communicating, it takes a lot of hard work.

I I love watching interviews of people when they kind of like cross the finish line of whatever thing they're endeavoring to do.

Whenever I watch an athlete and maybe they just got finished winning the Super Bowl, or or maybe they've broken a record and you talk to them and you're like, man, how do you feel?

How did how did you get here?

There's ultimately a moment where they say, Man, it took a lot of blood, a lot of sweat, and a lot of tears.

And ultimately what they're communicating is that, man, there's a there's for the athlete, I I had to modify my diet.

There's a lot of places that I could go that I couldn't go.

There's a lot of things that that I had to do that nobody else would do.

I had to get there early, I had to stay there late.

It took a lot of blood, a lot of sweat, and a lot of tears.

For us, it's easy for us to celebrate the outcome without us necessarily recognizing the output that it takes to get there.

It's easy for us to say when we look at someone and see the success that they have without reverse engineering what it took for them to be successful.

I have many friends that are successful businessmen and business women, and when I talk with them, I celebrate where they are, but I love to understand how they got there.

To me, that's what I love to hear.

And when I hear these conversations, I often hear about the blood, the sweat, and the tears.

I hear the stories about the not having any employees, the having to handle all the orders on their own, working out of their garages, sacrificing all their time and energy and making all these adjustments in our lives in order to be successful.

It took a lot of blood, a lot of sweat, and a lot of tears.

See, ultimately, when we look at what that phrase is, it's communicating sacrifice.

That we understand that that we when we want to accomplish anything that's meaningful, it's going to cost us something.

In fact, sacrifice is defined the act of giving up something valuable for another benefit, for another person or for some other type of benefit.

That we ultimately know that if we want to be successful in something, it's going to require us to have a measure of sacrifice.

And so when I was preparing for this message, I did a little bit of research to try to just get a sense of who are or what is the group of people that I would say have the largest amount of sacrifice.

Like I wanted to get a sense of people groups, like what are the biggest sacrifices that we see amongst community?

And so when I did a quick Google search, it came up and it showed me that there are definitely lists of people that sacrifice.

Certainly, we see we see teachers sacrificing all that they have to put into it.

We know the military, they sacrifice and all that they put into it.

But no matter how many times I've researched this, no matter how many times I Googled it, no matter what variation of words that came up, number one on the list every single time was parents.

Parents, without fail, were the ones that rank the highest every time when it comes to sacrifice.

So I began to look at some of the things that parents give up for their children and for their families.

I see that there are some people that are expecting children.

Pastor Nate is expecting a baby.

So I want to prepare you guys for what you are entering into when you say that you are prepared to be a parent and the sacrifice that comes with it.

I want to prepare you.

Now listen, children are good, they're wonderful, they're blessings from the Lord.

But let me let you know, here's some of the things that we sacrifice.

Watch this.

We sacrifice sleep.

Yolanda gets it.

I'm still tired, and my kids are adults.

We we sacrifice time.

Your time is no longer your time anymore.

Like you are basically an Uber driver without any tips.

Like you're you're giving up you're giving up time.

Sometimes you're giving up career.

There's a there's career opportunities and things that you just can't do both at the same time.

So you have a choice to make.

Sometimes personal interest.

Personal interest.

Like I remember talking to someone and asking me, like, hey Keith, what do you like to do?

I'm like, I don't know, whatever my kids say.

Like, I literally have lost a sense of the things that I like in the TV shows that I like because like you just you give those things up, you don't even know what they are.

Money.

Can the church say amen to that?

I'm I'm still actively working on pulling together a list of what I feel like my children owe me.

Um so just when they make it to the level that I feel like it's inappropriate, that when y'all pay me, y'all not doing me a favor.

Like, this is actually just payback from all the sacrifices that I make.

Social life, what is that?

I have no friends.

Like, you you know what I mean?

We know that.

Like, you just you're just kind of stuck in this ecosystem.

Um, sometimes they say health, and this one was really scary when I saw this.

Emotional and mental well-being.

Like, good Lord.

Now go out and have some babies.

Y'all be fruitful and multiply.

No, listen, listen, these are these are all these are all wonderful things, but it's just helping us to really put into uh understanding that whenever we're looking to make a difference in somebody else's life, it's sacrifice.

I still vividly remember when when Keith Jr.

and DeNira were much younger when they were like in Pop Warner.

Any Pop Warner families in here where their kids were playing football and De Niro was playing, um, she was doing cheerleading.

And so we were a one-car family at that time.

And so like they had different games going on at different parts of the city at different times, and like we would get up at like five o'clock in the morning, and I would drop Megan and De Niro off at one part of town, and me and Keith Jr.

would go in another part of town.

He would play his game, she would cheer, then we would come back together, then we would come back home, and we would do this every single week in the hot, blistering sun.

Why?

What are we doing this for?

My son wasn't even starting.

Like, but he will hate that I said that.

He will hate that I said that.

God, forgive me.

We'll talk about it in counseling.

But he wasn't even starting.

He wasn't even starting.

But but why but why do we do these things?

We give it up and we don't look for anything major in return, but the thing that motivates us is love.

Love is like something about love.

It just compels you to do something that that may not make sense.

There's something about love that just inspires us to make a difference, even though we may not necessarily get it back.

See, sacrifice is the joy of giving up what we love best for those we love most.

It's something that you care for.

I care for my time.

I I care for all the things that I've given up for my family, but I'm giving up because I love them the most.

Here's another thing that I've learned in my own family.

This is something how I can tell me and Megan are on a good terms.

I'm just trying to help some of y'all out there.

Now, for our and our family, sharing is a thing that's it's expected, but also it can be a challenge, specifically when it comes to food.

Okay, so so if Megan has a plate of food and I have a plate of food, I finish my food, and then if I'm like, man, like that looks really good, I can tell if Megan loves me if she is willing to share it with me.

I'm just trying to help some of y'all out there.

This is how it is in my family.

So I know that I'm like, wow, Megan, that looks really good.

She's like, yep, it is.

And she keeps eating it, then that means that somewhere along the line, I violated and I need to get I need to get reconciled.

But when she gives me her last bite of food, like it is good, honey, and you can have this last bite.

I know that it has been a good week for me.

I'm like, hey, babe, you know what?

We can stop at Target on the way home.

You can buy whatever you like.

Target.

We're not we're not quite at Louis Vuitton levels.

We stop at Target.

Um, but but I'm letting her know, like, hey, because I can see that we're in a good place.

And what's the thing that motivates all of this?

It all comes down to love.

Love inspires us to sacrifice.

Love inspires us to give to someone else something that we wouldn't even want ourselves, but we view them as being valuable.

Now, it's in light of this when we begin to think about this gospel concept that we're talking about right now, that when we look to Jesus, we understand the significance of his sacrifice for us that he took on the cross.

I want us to think for a moment that when the Bible says that God loves us so much, he loves us so much that he gave us his only begotten son.

Think about this.

He sacrificed Jesus something that and someone that he viewed as valuable, but you sacrifice something that you view as valuable for something that you love most.

He loves us so much that he gave up what was valuable to him because we are valuable to him.

It changes the way that we understand what Jesus did on the cross when we are motivated by the fact that Jesus loves us, that he stepped out of the throne room of heaven, that he was literally being serenaded by angels nonstop, singing, holy, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty.

That is what he heard his entirety of his existence, but then he comes down to heaven or he comes down here to earth and he hears crucify him.

Why would he give that up?

For you.

You you are what motivated him.

What Hebrews 12 actually tells us is that he joyfully did it.

It says with the joy that was in front of him, that even when he was in the garden of Gethsemane and he was having this moment of having the weight of sin placed upon his shoulders and him not wanting to die, but understanding the mission that was in front of him, it says that because of the joy of knowing that we would be restored to God, he did it.

What if I were to tell you that in Jesus' most discouraging moments, the thing that motivated him to move forward was you.

You you motivated Jesus to finish his mission, you motivated Jesus to go to the cross, you motivated Jesus to not fight back when the false accusations came against him.

You are a motivated Jesus' sacrifice.

What Jesus shows us is that sacrifice is the currency of the kingdom.

And it's through that we understand the part that we play with also reciprocating that.

Let's be honest with ourselves.

We're in the kingdom context, but everything we do has a measure of sacrifice to it.

Giving is absolutely a sacrifice.

As much as we see it in God's word, as much as we understand the difference that it makes, as much as we understand the influence of partnering with God's vision in the church, but every time it's time for us to give, it becomes that thing that is still a sacrifice because there's so many other things that we could do with it.

Coming to church every week can be a sacrifice.

Because we all know that there's something about sleeping in on Sundays that just feels right.

I don't know if I'm the only person and I pastor at church, but there's something about my sleep on Saturday night that Sunday morning just seems like this is the day that I should sleep in.

It seems like that's the one day that I could get the most rest.

It's the day that I could be the most effective.

I can run the most errands, I could be the most efficient.

But there's something to be said about prioritizing God.

In spite of that, coming to church is absolutely a sacrifice.

Serving is a sacrifice.

There are people that have come here as early as five o'clock in the morning to get into the building, to set up the cameras, to orient this place so that we could come in and worship.

And I promise you, it's not because they have more hours in the day than we do.

Their weeks aren't longer than ours.

They're sacrificing because they view every single one of you as worth it.

They they see it as I'm willing to give up these things because it's in partnership with the vision of God.

Coming to groups, it's a sacrifice.

Because we all know the busyness that we have in our lives and working all day and having to make decisions and then having to get off work and rush and drive across town, fight through traffic, and we know that it's a sacrifice, but it's worth it.

Because I know that I could either fight through the traffic and get amongst a bunch of people that I know can sharpen me, encourage me, and make me better, or I can go home and binge watch something that's not going to make me spiritually better, and I'm gonna wonder why I'm stuck in the same cycle.

I may be sacrificing, but you best believe it's worth it.

It's understanding that it's 100% worth it.

Walking the ways of Jesus is a sacrifice.

And the beautiful thing about sacrificing in the kingdom is that God will be our compensation for every sacrifice that we make, and He will compensate for every sacrifice that we make.

Jesus shows us that sacrifice is the currency of the kingdom.

And what goes with sacrifice is understanding that sacrifice becomes the conduit for a new covenant.

That sacrifice is the conduit for a new covenant.

I want to talk to us really briefly about this idea of covenant.

If you have your Bibles, you may recognize that it's split into two separate sections, the Old Covenant or New Covenant, or maybe Old Testament or New Testament.

Ultimately, what a covenant is, it's a binding agreement.

And what that means for us is it simply means the way that God engaged humans before Jesus and the way that God engaged people since Jesus.

Old Testament, New Testament.

It's this idea of how God has engaged community.

Now, the beautiful thing is that covenant was established with God developing relationship with people and communicating his plans and his purposes.

And what we see in scripture, specifically in the Old Testament, the first time that covenant was birthed was through Noah.

That when he says to Noah, I will never again destroy their earth, that was his promise.

I'm creating a covenant with you, a promise to you that I'm not going to do this again.

Then we see Abraham's covenant comes into mix.

We see that in Genesis 12, where he comes to Abraham and says, Listen, through you, I'm going to bless every people group on earth.

That's my promise to you.

Here's my conviction.

This is what I'm going to do.

We fast forward, then we get to Moses.

Now, Moses, he begins to zero it down even more.

Building on the previous, but now through Moses, he says, okay, through this lineage, we're going to allow the Messiah.

I want you guys to create the structure of what it means to worship the one and true and living God.

This whole idea of covenant built on the previous to the previous, and it was all pointing towards Jesus.

And every covenant was activated by the spilling of blood.

Now, for me, when I first got involved in the church, I approached it asking a lot of questions, and maybe you have as well.

And the questions that I've asked is why is Christianity so bloody?

Like what is it about blood?

Because when you look and read in the Bible, you just see sacrifice and blood.

And if we're honest with ourselves, there's a moment, yes, that we expect that people that are away from God to that can get that.

But if we were looking on the outside, looking in, that sounds kind of weird.

Like, what's up with all the blood?

Why does something have to die?

Well, well, scripture shows us exactly where it takes place.

The reason why a covenant was activated by the usage of blood is because it was communicating to the partners that what was done to the animal can be done to me if I don't hold up my end of the bargain.

That that the same way that this animal died, I am saying that I am willing to die if I don't fulfill what I said I'm going to do as a part of our agreement.

So now it's with this understanding that when we see that God issues promises to us through covenant, God is so consistent and making sure that He says, I will stand on my word.

I am willing to put my own existence on the line and saying that if I don't follow through on what I said I'm going to do for you, then let what was done to this animal be done to me.

This is what gives me faith when I read God's word and I see the promises that He's issued through covenant, and my life doesn't match up to it.

I evaluate what am I doing that's out of alignment, but if I'm doing my part, I then begin to stand on God's word.

I begin to stand on his promises and say, God, I'm looking at your word, and your word says that you are not going to destroy mankind, and I feel destroyed right now.

So I'm expecting to see provision that's going to come through.

Lord, I'm looking at your word, and your word says that through your blood, that I'm going to see blessing from my family, and I'm expecting to see a blessing in my family, God.

I'm looking through your word, and your word tells me that we're going to see redemption and restoration and resurrection.

And I don't see it right now, but I refuse to move away from it because you are not a man that you should love.

And I know that if you said it, you're going to do it.

If you're starting it, you're going to finish it.

I'm going to stand on your word and I will not let you go until you bless me.

I'm preaching better than y'all are responding, but sometimes you just got to anchor yourself in the promises of God and say, God, I will not move until you bless me.

This is what we get through the covenant.

And Jesus ushers in a whole new covenant.

He ushers in this new idea through his shed blood of what we have access to.

And I want to share three primary thoughts with us on what we now have access to through the blood of Jesus.

The first thing that we have through this covenant, through the blood of Jesus, is that the blood of Jesus pays for our sins.

This is a big one.

The blood of Jesus pays for our sins.

Let me unpack this for a moment.

You see, for me in my family, I have three children.

My oldest is Keith Jr., he's 29.

Daniera, she's 26, and then Caleb, he's 19.

And so, as you can see by the ages, um, that there's a little bit of a distance, particularly between Caleb and his older siblings.

And so they were all born at different, what I call dispensations of what it meant to be my child.

Okay, so so for Keith Jr., he was the practice kid.

We had no clue what we're doing.

We were so young, we're just trying to figure it out.

De Nira came in and we were trying to figure it out, but we still were basically as equally as clueless.

We just had two.

And then we had a seven-year gap.

Now, in that seven-year gap, we we were a little bit further along in our career, had a little bit more money in our account, had a little bit better basic understanding of what parenting looked like.

And so now they refer to Caleb as our child of privilege.

That's literally what they call him.

They call him the privileged child.

He didn't deal with the same discipline.

And I think honestly, what it was, we were just too exhausted to care anymore.

Like, son, go ahead.

I don't care if you watch TV all day, it just doesn't matter anymore.

It's whatever, you'll be fine.

Like, so we just kind of like so are literally in our household, it's it's like pre-Caleb and post-Caleb.

That's how we divide time in a Pittman household.

But but watch this.

Like, so for Keith Jr.

and De Nira, they were born into an ecosystem that they didn't ask for.

They weren't asked, they didn't ask to be born into a family that was struggling financially.

They didn't ask for it.

It was just what they inherited because of the time at which they were born.

That's what happened with us when we were born into this season of sin.

We were just born into an ecosystem where sin is prevalent and it's everywhere.

We didn't ask for it, but here we are.

And because of what Adam and Eve, when they rebelled against God, the the sin and the invasiveness of sin and the pervasion of sin, it's just everywhere.

And the sad thing is that we can't even make clear distinctions of it anymore.

I often hear people say, Man, why doesn't God come down and just deal with sin once and for all?

Why don't he just wipe out all of sin?

And and I understand where it comes from because whenever we see oppression, whenever we see harm, whenever we see mass shootings, whenever we see these things, we're like, man, like this will be so this will be settled if we just remove sin.

But God in his brilliance understood that if I come down and if I literally dealt with sin, it would eradicate all of humanity because it's still in all of us.

This is why Jesus gives that parable of the wheat and the tares.

If I were to tear up sin, then it's gonna tear up all of us.

And so by his grace, he issued a response to it.

So let's back up and look at this sin system that we now find ourselves living in.

Adam and Eve are given an opportunity to follow the ways of God, or they are given an opportunity to create their own path.

We know the story, they decide they want to do things their own way.

So they go and take from the one thing that God told them not to do.

And the consequence of that was sin, the consequence of that was death, the consequence of that was corruption, hierarchy, government structures, and we can't even make a distinction of what's good and what's not.

It's all a part of where we live now.

And what happens from that moment is that God confronts Adam and Eve about it.

And when he confronts them about it, they back away.

And the Bible says their eyes were open, and it was revealed to them that they were naked, they were vulnerable, and they ran and they hid.

But even in spite of that sinful condition, God had a plan.

What scripture says is that God clothed them with animal skins.

God clothed them with animal skins.

This is the first time that something had to die in order to cover man's sin.

That activated the sacrificial system that we now know of today.

Something had to die in order to cover up for man's mistake.

This then created the idea of an altar.

So when an altar was created, it was the place where I bring something that I'm willing to sacrifice so that I can meet with God.

So that's why you may see sometimes during worship that people will come and bring it to the altar.

There's times where we open up the altar, the idea is that I'm willing to lay this down in exchange of picking up God's peace.

It's the beauty of coming to the altar, recognizing it's the meeting place with God.

We fast forward now, and then God then creates a system, the sacrificial system.

And inside of that sacrificial system was the Day of Atonement.

This is something that's still celebrated by our Jewish brothers and sisters to this day.

It's referred to as Jom Kippur.

It's their most holy day.

And it's the one day that the sins of the nation are forgiven for all the people.

But there was a lot of procedure that had to take place.

And part of the procedure was they would find a scapegoat, literally.

They would find an animal, they would place their hands on the head of the animal, and they would confess all of their sins onto the animal, transferring their sins onto the animal, and then they would release the animal into the wild.

They would then kill another animal, and that was how the priest was able to go into the presence of God.

The sins have been moved on to someone else, and now the priest can go into the presence of God.

This is a lot, but I want you guys to stick with me for a moment.

The sins were transferred, the priest was made holy, now I can go and engage in the presence of God without fear of judgment.

For the people that were struggling with trying to reconcile the part that Jesus played, they didn't fully receive that Jesus was the perfect sacrifice.

So even in spite of Jesus dying on the cross and being the perfect sacrifice and all of the sins of humanity being transferred to him, they still felt like they had to do something else in order to deal with their sin issue.

The truth be told, some of us may still feel as if we have to do something else in order to deal with our sin issue.

So what the Hebrew writer is trying to help them to understand, no, if you only could see that Jesus' death transcends all time, because he was the perfect sacrifice and because he was a human just like you, that his sacrifice satisfies God's wrath for now, for the past, as well as for the future.

So there's not another single thing you need to do except for receive it and begin to walk it out and walk in victory and deliverance of him.

If we could recognize that when Jesus died on the cross, that handled the sin issue from this point forward.

There's not anything else you need to do except receive it.

There's not anything else you need to do except walk in it.

But when Jesus died on a cross, it was for deliverance for every single one of us.

When God sees us, he doesn't see us through the sins, he sees us through the finished work of Jesus on the cross.

That's what it means when it says the blood.

When he sees us, he sees that the blood that the sins have been transferred to Jesus and he sees us through the blood of Christ.

The Bible says that the wages of sin is death, but the gift that comes from God is through Christ Jesus.

Jesus became our atoning sacrifice.

So the same way that Adam ushered sin in, Jesus ushered sin away.

The same way that Adam created a debt for sin, Jesus paid that debt on our behalf.

That we are set free as a result of what Jesus did on the cross.

And the beautiful thing, it's not based off of our performance, it's based off of his.

In fact, his performance gives us power, and his blood provides us with a blessing.

It's the blood of Jesus.

The second thing that the blood of Jesus does is the blood of Jesus removes our shame.

It removes our shame.

That he removes our shame.

And we'd be surprised at how shame and embarrassment and all those things can really affect us.

I'm not sure if you've ever really been like deeply, deeply embarrassed.

I'm talking about like ashamed, embarrassed, like can't even look someone in the eye.

We've all had different moments and instances where that's taken place, but I still have one that it haunts me like a bad dream.

About 15 years ago, um, well, I guess probably closer to 20 years ago, I used to work in in the in the school system.

And I would work with different principals.

I would travel around and and connect with different principals and do some training.

And I still remember this so vividly that I would see some of these principals maybe like once or twice a year.

So you're always doing catch up, you haven't seen them in a while, and you're you're just re-engaging because this is before the days of like Zoom calls, so you just didn't see people.

And so I saw this one principal and um and I saw her.

Her and I had a really good, cordial, working relationship.

So I noticed that um that she had picked up a little bit of weight.

And so my assumption was that she was pregnant.

Listen, man, I went through it once.

I don't need y'all to shame and ridicule too, okay?

The blood of Jesus set me free.

Y'all will not put this on my shoulders.

But let's let's relive this for a moment.

So we're there, we're talking, we're laughing, we're joking, and and then she gets really excited, and she jumps up from her desk for a moment.

It's like, oh, this is really good news.

And she's jumping up and down, and I'm like, hey, listen, calm down.

I don't want your water to break.

And she's looking around at her desk, like, what water?

And she's like, what are you talking about?

I was like, what do you mean?

And she's like, water break.

She's like, I'm not pregnant.

And like she looks down at her stomach, and when she looks at her stomach, I look at her stomach, and I'm like, You sure?

I'm like, no.

And I didn't say that for real.

I look at her and I'm like, oh my gosh.

I'm like, I am so, so sorry.

Like, I'm a person, like I speak, I talk, I could talk my way in or out of anything.

I had no words, like I'm brown, I turned white that day.

Like it was just all like I'm just pale.

I didn't know what to do with it.

She laughs it off.

To this day, I can't look her in her eye.

To this day, if I were to see her right now, I would say hi and just keep it pushed.

Like, I it's so awkward, it's so uncomfortable.

I'm filled with so much shame, and and and it's hard for me to move forward in relationship because of the shame that's in front of me, and it's it's uncomfortable.

And I don't know if she's thinking about the mistake that I made, so I don't even know how to engage her appropriately.

So I just want to run away from that.

You catching what I'm saying here.

The way that sin has a way to get in front of our lives is that what can happen is we end up carrying the baggage and the ridicule that comes with the sin that can cause us running from the very thing that's supposed to help us.

I can't tell you how many people I've talked to that run away from the church instead of coming to church because of shame.

What we see with Adam and Eve is that when they fall into this sinful condition, scripture says that they ran away from God and they sewed fig leaves together.

Instead of running to God and saying, Lord, I fell short and these are the mistakes that I made, they ran away from him and they said they were afraid.

They ran away from the very architect of life and tried to find a way to cover up their own death.

See, the thing about sin is it has this ability to get us to a point where we we're riddled with shame, we're riddled with insecurities, we're riddled with fear, and we have these things, and it can just cause us to fall further and further away.

But what God shows us that because of the sacrifice of Christ on the cross, that his shed blood said that there's no condemnation to those who were in Christ Jesus.

That means there's not a single thing that you have done Jesus did not consider when he went to the cross.

There's not a single mistake that you have made or that you will make that Jesus didn't take to the cross when he died.

This is why when God came to Adam and Eve and they said, Lord, we were naked, he said, Who told you you were naked?

Who who told you you weren't good enough?

Who told you that mistake disqualified you from being in my presence?

And unfortunately, many of us still carry that shame and that baggage to this day.

There are people that feel like because of the mistakes that they've made, that somehow they're disqualified from being used from God.

So I just simply want to use those same words.

Who told you that you weren't good enough?

Who told you that you weren't valuable?

Who told you that you weren't a child of God?

Who told you that you were insignificant?

The Bible says that the blood of Jesus washed away every single one of your sins.

And when he sees you, he sees you as his son, he sees you as his daughter, he sees you as valuable, he sees you as having a calling, he sees you as having a purpose.

The blood of Jesus removes every bit of our shame.

It allows us to know that we can go boldly before the throne of grace and move forward with what God has ultimately called us to do.

See, scripture tells us a story about a man that Jesus had healed in the temple, and that this man's broken condition would have disqualified him from even being allowed in the temple.

So he was in the temple, but his condition was hidden.

In the temple, but no one knew what was wrong with him.

But Jesus sees him and says, Stretch out your hand.

And with fear, wondering if when people see that he's broken, he has his leprosy hand, if they're gonna kick him out of community, he stretches his hands out and Jesus looks around and says, I'm gonna heal this man right here.

He heals the man, and now the shame has been lifted.

My concern is that maybe we live in an ecosystem where we're filled with so much shame that instead of us bringing our pain to Jesus, we're hiding it under a cloak and we're worshiping, but we're still filled with shame.

We're giving, but we're still filled with shame.

We're serving, but we're still filled with shame.

That we're running off and we have fig leaves to cover up our shame instead of bringing it into the presence of God.

But when we understand the power of the blood of Jesus, we know that it removes our shame and that we can come boldly into his presence because all have fallen short of the glory of God.

Can we get a good amen for that?

The third and final thing I want to share with us, and I'm gonna ask the worship team to come back out and join me at this time, is that the blood of Jesus restores our access to God.

He restores our access to God.

See what scripture tells us that when Adam and Eve had fallen into sin, that these giant angels were there and they protected the presence of God so that they could not gain entry into Eden anymore while they were in their sinful condition.

Those those cherubim angels were literally stitched on the curtains of the temple as a reminder that there's a separation between man and God because sin goes before us.

It's such a deep, intricate process.

But because of the sacrifice of Christ on the cross, the Bible says that that when he died, that the veil of the temple was ripped in half, and now people had access to the holiness of God without fear of being judged because Jesus died as the ultimate sacrifice.

He gave them access.

Now, for some of us, when we get access, it's it changes the way that we walk, it changes the the hesitation that we move in.

Have you ever had access to something and you just didn't know if you should be back there?

A friend of ours, they they work in one of the amusement parks here in in Orlando, and um they had given us like their guest pass.

And and at the time I didn't know what that meant.

We had only been living here maybe for about six or seven months at the time.

And so when they gave us the guest pass, um, we showed up at the park.

But apparently this was like a baller guest pass.

Like this this person was higher up on a food chain than I had ever suspected.

So when we walk up to the front gate and we hand them, they're like, Oh, you got the platinum card.

I'm like, yeah, it looks silver to me, but yeah, cool.

They're like, they're like, hey, do you do you want us to walk you around the park?

I'm like, Yeah, sure.

So literally, we're we're walking around the amusement park, and I've got this person that's walking us through, narrating every ride we're about to get onto.

And then I'm thinking, like, hey, we're about to get on this ride.

It says it's like an hour and a half wait.

I'm thinking at best they're gonna put us in the fast pass lane.

I'm happy with that.

He said, Hey, like, I stand in the fast pass lane.

He's like, No, no, no, we're just gonna walk to the front.

I'm like, to the front of the line?

So, so as we're walking, we're coming through, and then you know, like all the people that have been there all day long are looking at you, like wondering who you are, what makes you so special.

So, as we're walking by, like the first time I felt a little embarrassed, I'm like, oh man, like it's so weird, it's so uncomfortable.

Like, by the third one, your boy was like, Oh, it's too bad.

You guys gotta wait out here in the sun.

This is crazy.

I got on one ride three times and saw the same people saying, like, yeah, you still here?

That's crazy.

This ride is amazing.

Like, I got on every ride at the park while you were still in this line.

Like, it was crazy.

I God knows that pride comes before the fall.

But but watch this.

We're getting on these rides, we're being walked to the front of the line, and as we started getting on more and more rides, my discomfort disappeared and I began to feel more confident because I had access.

I wasn't, it wasn't based off of what I purchased, it wasn't because of work that I had done.

I didn't do anything, but because someone had shared their access with me, I was getting royal treatment.

If we could recognize that the blood of Jesus gives us access into the throne room of heaven, and it's not because of anything that we've done, it's not based on my performance, it's not based off of my work, but it's simply because I am in right relationship with Jesus that I have access to everything that heaven has for me.

That means that heaven's resources are available to me.

That means that hailing is available to me, that means that breakthrough is available to me, that means that revival is available to me.

That means that miracles are available to me.

That means that resources are available to me because Jesus has given me access to the throne room of heaven.

I don't need to walk around it, I don't need to tiptoe, I don't need to be afraid, but I can walk with boldness, knowing that Jesus paid the price for me to be sitting in this seat.

And there's a confidence that's there, there's a boldness that's there, there's a fire that's there, that I don't have to sustain my own ability to be here.

It's because of the blood of Jesus.

It's the blood of Jesus that gives us all access.

See, I I grew up in a church tradition where we would say, I plead the blood of Jesus.

It was just what we did when you got to a point where you were dealing with situations that exceeded your vocabulary, when you were dealing with circumstances that you didn't even necessarily have a scripture reference to to understand it, we would simply say, I plead the blood of Jesus over this situation.

I do this virtually every day.

And this is not a matter of semantics, but it's a it's a declaration of faith because when we plead the blood of Jesus, what it's meant to say is that everything that the blood of Jesus represents, I declare it over my life.

The blood of Jesus represents freedom, I declare it over my life.

The blood of Jesus represents healing, I declare it over my life.

The blood of Jesus represents resurrection, I declare it over my life.

Forgiveness of sins, removal of shame, access to the throne room of heaven, I declare it over my life.

A couple of years ago, I was going through one of those seasons where this was not a series of circumstances, but I could tell it was it was outright spiritual warfare.

And you know when you could tell when something is spiritual warfare, when it's just not logical anymore.

It's just it's something that's weighty and it transcends logic, and it's a it's a set of circumstances that all have seemed to collapse at the same time.

And I found myself just like, I don't, I don't even know what to pray anymore.

I I don't know what scriptures to read, I don't even know what to do.

But what I began to do is I just began to walk around my house and say, But I plead the blood of Jesus.

Lord, this is I'm filled with so much stress and anxiety right now, and I don't even know what to pray, but I plead the blood of Jesus.

Lord, my resources are dried up, and I got so many expenses and things that are going on, and I just need your help.

But Lord, I plead the blood of Jesus.

Father, right now I'm dealing with chaos in my family, and family members are fighting with each other.

And there's all this dysfunction, and it's not lining up with your covenant will for our lives.

So I just plead your blood over this situation, God.

I just need the sacrifice of Christ to be exhibited in this and know that resurrection is available.

I just plead the blood of Jesus.

And family, I want to let you know the more that I plead the blood of Jesus, the more boldness that begins to rise up.

And now spiritual warfare begins to kick in, where I begin to recognize that we may not wrestle against flesh and blood, we wrestle against principalities, but I don't have to fight the battle because the battle is not mine's, it's the Lord's.

And so when I plead the blood of Jesus, I'm declaring God, I'm asking for you to get involved.

God, I'm asking for you to fight this battle because in my own strength I know that I can't do it.

There's nothing but the blood.

I know that there's a lot of options, I know that there's a lot of experts, but Jesus is greater.

In the 1800s, a song was written called Nothing but the Blood of Jesus.

It's an old school hymn that was really meant to serve as a prophetic reminder that we're going to be living in a world where we're going to have so many options and so many things flying for our attention and so many experts to tell us how we can accomplish this euphoric state.

But this song still reminds us that there is nothing but the blood of Jesus.

As a family and as a community, I want us to have a throwback moment.

I want us to stand on our feet.

We're going to sing this song together with declaration, and then we're going to conclude today's service by taking communion and celebrating the blood of Jesus.

But let us be reminded that the blood of Jesus is the only thing that can truly set us free.

Thanks again for listening.

We hope you enjoyed today's message.

We'd love for you to subscribe to our podcast and review and share what you heard today.

If you'd like more content like this, or you'd like to connect with us, go to celebration at orl.org.

We hope you join us next time.