Hebrews 9:15-28 Dean Delfosse

Did you notice that we Christians talk about blood a lot. Think back to the songs we sing. First song, Nothing But The Blood, Nothing But The Blood.

And of course, it's not because it's Halloween season.

No, it's because it's a steady reminder of the holiness of God and the heinousness of our sin.

And it is the only means by which we are made right with the holy God, is the sacrifice of Christ.

Don't just take my word for it.

If you have a Bible in front of you, or a Bible handy, would you locate Hebrews chapter 9?

Hebrews 9 · chapter mention

So if you're newer with us, my name is Dean Dolphas.

I I get to be one of the pastors here at Redemption Hill.

And so super thankful that the Lord is planting this little church three years now.

And that in his mercy, he is, it's always been the plan, but he has spawned off another church plant from us in Adams.

They're about a month old now, or just a few weeks old.

So praying this morning for Pastor Sam and our dear friends who have are going to uh or starting the church, village chapel in Adams.

And so as we meet and worship around God's word, that's me.

So do they.

So this morning, I'm gonna pick up reading in verse 11.

As we work our way through the book of Hebrews, chapter 9.

Hebrews 9 · chapter mention

Ooh, sorry, my bad, verse 15.

We did the first half last week, and we'll start the second half.

And feel free to look in the table of content if you can't find the book of Hebrews.

No one's gonna shame you for that.

That's fine.

Or if you're using like an app, you can Google it.

Hebrews chapter 9, verse 15, and following.

Hebrews 9:15

It sounds like you all have found it.

The scripture says, Therefore he is, this is talking about Christ, he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant.

For where a will is involved, the death of the one who made it must be established.

For a will takes effect takes effect only at death, since it is not in force as long as the one who made it is alive.

Therefore, not even the first covenant was inaugurated without blood.

For when every commandment of the law had been declared by Moses to all the people, he took the blood of calves and goats, with water and scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people, saying, This is the blood of the covenant that God commanded for you.

And in the same way he sprinkled with blood both the tent and all the vessels used in worship.

Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood.

And without blood, without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins.

Thus it was necessary for the copies of the heavenly things to be purified with these rites, but the heavenly things themselves, with better sacrifices than these.

For Christ has entered into holy places made with sorry, Christ has entered not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf.

Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood that is not his own, for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world.

But as it is, he has appeared once for all, at the end of the ages, to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

And just as it is appointed for a man once to die, and after that comes judgment, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin, but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.

This is the word of the Lord, and it is marvelous.

Heavenly Father, we thank you again and ask you for help as we come to feast on your word together and to share in its bounty and its riches.

We pray that the Holy Spirit would do that searching work through your word.

And Lord, um, search out all the corners of our minds, hearts, understandings that are contrary to your word and rotting from the stench of this world wrecked with sin and its effect on our thinking.

We pray, Lord, that you would renew our minds and hearts in Christ Jesus and watch over our attentiveness.

Lord, please keep my mind from wandering, our minds from wandering, and watch over my tongue and spare your people my foolishness.

Please, Lord, honor your name and invigorate your people, we ask.

All in the name of Christ.

Amen.

Hebrews walks us through what Christ has done.

Christ is so much better than everything else that was going on before.

And everything that was going on before was setting up and leading to Christ.

And if you've been with us for a while, the book of Hebrews has been on this topic of Christ the mediator for some time.

And every time the writer of Hebrews returns to this topic, it's like turning a diamond pure and bright in the light, and a different facet shines through.

A different nuance is highlighted.

So last time when we started Hebrews chapter nine, we spoke of the difference between Christ as high priest.

Now the writer is speaking of Christ once again as mediator.

Look at verse 15.

Therefore, he is the mediator of a new covenant.

And so this language of arrangement or a way of relating to two parties relating to one another, covenant, a very, very, very basic bare bones understanding of covenant, an agreement between two parties.

But it's a serious agreement.

Maybe one of the closest in scripture is a marriage covenant.

And yet God's covenant with man is so much greater than that.

Marriage definitely alludes to it.

So much greater than that.

Where the high king or the great lord or the or the true husband comes to rescue and have a people for himself.

And to establish an agreement with them of eternal faithfulness.

And both sides need to keep that agreement.

No fooling around on our husband.

And so God set up stipulations.

And what seems like religious rituals, when you read the Old Testament, is all about access to the living God for guilty sinners.

And so he goes in to talk about how Christ has come now to fulfill all that was going on before and what it pointed to, so that if you ever wonder how it is that believers under the Old Covenant or Old Testament, that first big part of your Bible called the Old Testament, if you wonder how they were saved or how were they right with God?

Did they just say sorry enough and mean it?

How many bulls and goats and rams, rivers of blood, how much does it take?

Verse 15 helps solve that problem.

By Christ coming on the scene, part of his crosswork reaches back in time and covers the sins of his people.

Verse 15.

Therefore, he is the meteor of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from transgressions committed under the first covenant.

And not only does he do a crosswork that reaches back in time, it stretches us into, it stretches into this present time, this new arrangement.

It calls them into this new covenant, this new existence, this new arrangement that brings together and fulfills what the writer calls a promised eternal inheritance.

Inheritance.

What will you leave your family when it's your time to die?

Inheritance.

And whatever that is, it's temporary.

This is an eternal inheritance that was promised by God so long ago.

An eternal inheritance.

For all of us who are called.

So to be rescued from our sin and its consequences, Scripture says over and over, everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.

So on our part, we experience it as calling on the name of the Lord or putting our faith in Christ and his work.

But every now and then scripture speaks of it from the other direction.

The first mover.

That God is the one who does a calling.

So again, verse 15, so all who are called, and this is not just me speaking to you or you speaking to your friends at work and at school, calling them, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved.

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

Come and believe, come and welcome Jesus, the risen, rescued, Savior King.

I call on you, I'm begging on you.

So there is that, and definitely do that.

The world desperately needs you and I to have the courage to explain and call them to faith in Jesus.

He is ridiculed everywhere, he's taken for granted everywhere.

And our culture, raised in a churchanity, is haunted with the afterglow of Jesus, but no substance at all.

So there's a desperate need for you and I who understand the good news clearly, to have the courage to speak.

And I understand that that's not easy.

So let's pray for one another and encourage one another.

But in this passage, it's from the other side.

It's God's call to us.

A divine, omnipotent, rescuing call that calls us out of darkness and into his marvelous light, out of death, into life, out of rebellion and into rescue.

A call.

And all those who have that divine call inherit this eternal inheritance.

And the reason why that's true is because a death has finally occurred that redeems from the transgressions committed under the first covenant.

So even when you and I did not realize it, and God made this with Israel, it's still something that stretches across to humanity in a certain sense that the rules that govern that all arrangement are true universally.

There is only one true God, and He is to be first.

So, as Jesus summed it up, we love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love our neighbor as ourselves.

The sins, the transgressions, the breaking of that love for God and one another under the first arrangement is covered by the blood of Christ.

A death has finally occurred that redeems.

It's not the death of bulls, goats.

It's this death.

It's his death.

A death has occurred finally.

That actually does the work that all the other deaths were pointing to.

And the writer.

This word covenant, old covenant, new covenant, is related exactly to what we call the two parts of our Bible, Old Testament and New Testament.

And even if you don't know what testament means, maybe you've heard the phrase, this is my last will and testament.

So now the writer is picking up on this play of words, where if you're gonna inherit something, you're not gonna inherit it until your loved one dies.

That was the problem with the prodigal son.

Prodigal son came to his father and said, You know, all the stuff that's gonna be mine when you die, I want it right now.

I'm gonna pretend like you're dead.

How's that for love?

So the need for the one who is bequeathing to actually die.

Look at these next verses.

Verse 16.

For where a will is involved, the death of the one who made it must be established.

For a will takes effect only at death and does not enforce as long as the one who made it is alive.

Therefore, not even the first covenant was inaugurated without blood.

So a quick little dip over to talk about the need for the one who is blessing you to actually die.

Just to say it wasn't enough for bowls and goats.

A person had to pass.

And now coming right back to make this point.

Verse 19.

Sorry, verse 18.

Therefore, not even the first covenant was inaugurated without blood.

It takes blood to get this started.

It takes blood to get the will into effect, the death of the one who made it.

And the first covenant or the Old Testament needed blood.

Verse 19, for every commandment that the law, when every commandment of the law had been declared through Moses to all the people, he took the blood of calves and goats and water and scarlet wool and hyssop.

And sprinkled both the book itself, that the tablets of stone, the Ten Commandments, the Word of God, the tablets of stone, the book itself.

And the people.

This is a one time in our culture where it's it's okay to walk around with like blood makeup dripping on your face or like dripping from your mouth with Dracula teeth on.

And what seems enticing on one hand or disgusting on another from your perspective.

Just realize that that's not an accident.

The Lord said from the beginning that the life is in the blood.

And we've thought about this before, haven't we not?

That you can hear the sacrifices every day.

You step out of your tent in the middle of the desert in the wilderness, and you don't hear birds chirping in the in the city parks or not flapping in the trees on your acreage.

You hear cattle being slaughtered.

Every day.

And the smell wafting through the camp every day.

A very palpable reminder that God is being gracious by wanting to be in our midst, Camp of Israel.

And yet we can't just saunter into his presence.

There's a need for sacrifice.

Can you imagine, like, so I'm I'm the pastor with a weird imagination, that's absolutely me.

He sprinkled both the book itself, the book of the Bible, the testament, and the people.

This is the blood of the covenant that God commanded for you.

This is the blood of the covenant that God commanded for you.

Mo, I just took a bath.

Yeah, now take a bath in this.

Because you can squeaky clean yourself on the outside all you want to, but there is something else required for you to be clean before the living God.

And so the sprinkling.

Verse 21, and in the same way, he sprinkled blood both on the tent and the vessels used in worship.

Indeed, on Under the law, almost everything is purified by blood.

And here's the famous verse in Hebrews, or one of them.

Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins.

Every sin that's been ever done against God, every sin that's ever been done against you, there will be no forgiveness of it without the shedding of blood.

Every wrong will be made right by the great judge of the universe.

Either he will cover our sin, and we receive it by faith, or we will do so ourselves for all eternity.

Look at the writer's great point.

So having established what Christ was done and how it contrasts to the need for blood to kind of get this whole thing started, look at verse 23.

Now we're talking about not just how things are started, but contrast and how what Christ has finally come and done in his final sacrifice.

Verse 23.

Thus is what was necessary for the copies of the heavenly things to be purified with these rites, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.

So a little earlier in the book of Hebrews, the writer made clear that God told Moses on Mount Sinai a long time ago, after he rescued the people out of Egypt, he said to him, Make sure that you make everything that's going to be in the tabernacle, temple, tent here.

Make sure you make all of that according to the copies, the blueprint that I showed you on the mountain.

And we've learned through the book of Hebrews that all of that that's in the Old Testament, the Ark of the Covenant, or the table here with the bread of the present, or the seven uh seven armed candle obra, that is it, Jewish symbol, all of that means something and points to a heavenly reality.

All of it is like shadow, blueprint, base model, pointing to heavenly realities.

And remarkably, like if you go to the book of Revelation and you and you turn it into chapter four, where the scene shifts from earthly stuff into heavenly stuff, we have a lot of the same things coming together.

We have this door opened in heaven, so like this the curtain is finally opened back and we're allowed in.

And on the mercy seat of the old covenant, it represented God's throne.

We actually have God's throne in chapter four.

We have the angels, statues of the angels covering the lid of the ark, what's called the mercy seat in the Old Testament, and we actually have angels, huge, terrifying beings, not little baby cherubs, but huge beings around the throne of God.

And not only seven lights, like the seven menores, but the powered by the seven spirits of God or his Almighty Spirit, searching out all creation, knowing all things.

And chapter five, the blood of Christ, by which there is access and redemption for his people.

Get a glimpse into the heavenly realities that's being spoken of.

Get a glimpse of it in Revelation chapter 4 and 5.

Revelation 4 · chapter mention

So Christ appears in heaven itself.

So this contrast, Old Testament things, better things, Christ purifies.

Watch verse 24.

For Christ has entered in not only into, sorry, for Christ has entered not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself.

Now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf.

So now not just the Old Testament saints, not just believers in the Old Testament, but now we who have come to see and understand Christ.

On our behalf.

And notice the second contrast, verse 25, nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as every high priest enters the holy places year after year with blood that's not his own.

And if he did that, he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world.

So if Christ's sacrifice was just a little better or just as good as bulls and goats, he would have had to be crucified over and over and over and over again since our first parents told God to shove off.

So since the founding of the world, when Adam and Eve rebelled against God, Christ would have had to be crucified over and over and over.

But God, but God saw better, planned better, knows better.

Held off on judgment.

Held off.

Think about Romans 3, Romans 4.

Paul quotes David: Blessed is a man whose sins are forgiven, whose iniquities will not count against him.

God was holding off on judging David.

Holding off on judging his people, holding off.

And God starts to look like a quack judge.

Dude, a crime was committed.

Ye promised death.

The soul that sins shall die.

In the day you eat of this, you will surely die.

And you're proving the snake right.

The snake said, You will not surely die.

And look, they're still alive.

No.

No.

Death came, came again and again.

But God takes his people for his own, looking forward to this death.

Look at the way, verse 26.

It's second half there.

But as it is, he has appeared once for all.

Not once and for all.

Like, I'm gonna do this once and for all.

I mean, it's definitely got that connotation to it, but it's once for all.

One appearance to cover all his people.

And all their sins, once for all, at the end of the ages, to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

Man, what a what a reality to kind of take in.

Like, what a commentary on our times.

This is the end of the ages.

The end started 2,000 years ago.

This is the end of the ages, and he means to wipe sin off the planet.

He puts away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

He is rescuing a people now, and as we'll learn at the end of this paragraph, he will come and take us to be with him.

And when there's a new heaven and a new earth, a world without end, without sin.

He appeared once.

Epiphany.

His appearing.

Whenever you read the scriptures, you start reading the New Testament and you run into that word, the appearing, take note of it.

It's three times in this paragraph.

I'll point them out to you before we're done.

Just Bible studyers, this is a really important word.

It doesn't just mean like, hey, look, there he is.

It means he stepped out to do something.

He's not hanging in the back.

Ah, I showed up.

He stepped out, center stage, to do something.

He has now appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

And then a third contrast, not just many sacrifices, but the one sacrifice of himself.

Now a contrast between all humanity and Christ, the great human.

Verse 27.

And just as, that's where the comparison comes.

And just as it is appointed for man once to die, and after that comes the judgment.

So just stop right there and let that sink in.

What is it you can't avoid?

Death and taxes?

The two things you don't want to ever talk at a bar is religion and government.

But the two things that are very much inevitable are death and taxes.

The reason why it's inevitable is because it has been appointed.

It has been appointed for humanity to die once.

I don't I don't want to, but it's an appointment I must make and I have got to keep.

But if somebody has said, I didn't make this appointment, I mean it's my fault.

But I didn't call and make this appointment.

An appointment with death.

God made this appointment.

And it's not the grim reaper.

We have an appointment with God.

It has been appointed for us to die at once.

And then comes a judgment.

And God arrives to make sure we keep our appointment on time.

So I can crack on us because we're Jamaican.

There's this phrase: every time we drive a little crazy on the you know, interstate or the uh turnpike in Florida, one of my parents will reach over and go, Your life is long, but you careless with it.

I can't even do the action.

I've been Americanized so long.

But their theology rocks.

I don't know when God's appointed for you to die, but dang, you're careless when you're driving.

There is no coming back as a bug or a slug or a cow or a higher being.

We die once.

No great wheels of reincarnation.

Once.

And with crystal clarity, the fog of this world lifts, and you see reality for what it actually is in forty billion high deaf.

And you see him by whom and for whom all things exist.

And you wonder, how did I ever take a breath without awareness of you?

You are awesome.

And I scorn you and took you for granted and clucked my tongue at you and bemiddled all your ways in my mind and with my mouth.

What was I thinking?

And yet you came to us in love, and held off judgment, and extended to us grace for the taking by the sacrifice of your own son.

A grace in which I stand, we stand, and will take us home.

So, in the same way that everybody's been appointed to die once, and after that comes a judgment, Christ also, having become human, has died once, and in this dying offered once to bear the sins of many.

And when we see him agree, the great judge of the universe, he will appear a second time, not to deal with sin, that he has already done by his first appearing, but to save or to bring deliverance or rescue.

To culminate, to bring it to an end, to finally bring in the promised eternal inheritance, bring it on.

But to save, I mean, what else do you call being taken out of this world?

What else do you call that?

Being saved.

I'm not getting I'm not just tired of like how people sin against me.

I'm tired of my own crap.

I'm tired of my own sin against the Father and against you.

I'm tired of me.

He will appear a second time to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.

I love those words, and I am convicted by those words.

He didn't say, although it's true, he didn't say he's coming to all those who believe in Jesus.

That's true.

That's true, that's true, that's true, that's true, that's true.

He said, by way of conviction, he's coming to rescue all those who are eagerly waiting for him, like a kid on Christmas Eve.

How are you doing?

How are you doing?

Can your eagerness for his appearing be described as eagerness?

Or have you been lulled asleep by the death lullaby of this world?

So that all your comforts are being chased after here.

And if the Lord would just delay coming for just a little bit, I would get that dream home or that vacation or win the lottery or blackity blah, or my kids would finally leave the house.

Whatever.

Like, whatever.

I didn't say that.

Somebody else said that.

How are you doing?

Don't, well, okay.

First take it as gut check, heart check.

That's fine.

Also take it as encouragement.

He means for his readers who are, chapter 12, flagging in their zeal, growing weary with this life, and being burdened and tempted to retreat back from Christ because of pressure so great.

He means for those words not to be only conviction, but encouragement.

He is coming.

The one who's done this for you is coming.

And he welcomes and desires and is striving for you to long for his appearing.

Oh, I'm I'm probably a little off.

Lord help me.

And he will.

And he will.

The reason a writer of Hebrews goes into such great detail about Christ is because the more you describe something lovely, is the more you long for it.

And he died once for all.

And here's the third appearing, which is actually the second.

He has now appeared in the presence of God for you.

So I'll give them to you.

He appeared once in a manger to a cross to bear the sins of many.

Verse 26.

He will appear a second time in this earthscape to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.

Verse 24.

That was verse 28.

Verse 24.

He has now appeared in the presence of God for you.

So when you ask the Lord, Lord, my heart is just fickle and cold towards you, and that eagerness that he talks about, like, I'm jaded.

I'm jaded.

Fix me, please.

However misworded that is, or whatever you didn't get right in that prayer, he is now appeared in the presence of God to intercede for you.

He takes all of that and praise it the right way.

He takes all that you forgot to ask and praise it the right way.

From beginning to end, your salvation is covered by a great Savior who is a mediator of a new agreement in his own blood.

So don't be tempted by reincarnation.

I'm not Don't be tempted by purgatory.

I get to work this off in eternity if I messed up somewhere.

Don't be misled by balancing the scales of justice by I gotta do a little bit better next year.

Twenty-seven's coming up, maybe I can do better than twenty-six.

Rest all your confidence on the one who appeared and appears and will appear for you.

Would you stand and pray with me?

So, Holy Father, in the name of Jesus, our King, who was and who is and who is to come, an attribute he shares with you.

We pray, Lord, that you would take your word now and zero in on all the truths that are there and plant not only conviction but mainly hope and grace in the lives of your people.

And we ask these things in his name.

Amen.