Hebrews 9: Sealed with Blood

[Heb 9:1 ESV] Now even the first covenant had regulations for worship and an earthly place of holiness.

Old Testament Rules

Civil, Ritual, Moral.

Christians still follow the Moral Code. 

Holiness means set apart:   Earthly place of holiness. 

The Earthly holy place. 

[Heb 9:2 ESV] For a tent was prepared, the first section, in which were the lampstand and the table and the bread of the Presence. It is called the Holy Place.

[Heb 9:3 ESV] Behind the second curtain was a second section called the Most Holy Place,

[Heb 9:4 ESV] having the golden altar of incense and the ark of the covenant covered on all sides with gold, in which was a golden urn holding the manna, and Aaron's staff that budded, and the tablets of the covenant.

[Heb 9:5 ESV] Above it were the cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat. Of these things we cannot now speak in detail.

A few of the Regulations: 

[Heb 9:6 ESV] These preparations having thus been made, the priests go regularly into the first section, performing their ritual duties,

[Heb 9:7 ESV] but into the second only the high priest goes, and he but once a year, and not without taking blood, which he offers for himself and for the unintentional sins of the people.

God’s too Holy, We are too evil.  No reconciliation yet.   

[Heb 9:8 ESV] By this the Holy Spirit indicates that the way into the holy places is not yet opened as long as the first section is still standing

[Heb 9:9 ESV] (which is symbolic for the present age). According to this arrangement, gifts and sacrifices are offered that cannot perfect the conscience of the worshiper,

[Heb 9:10 ESV] but deal only with food and drink and various washings, regulations for the body imposed until the time of reformation.

Jesus The High Priest

[Heb 9:11 ESV] But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation)

[Heb 9:12 ESV] he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.

[Heb 9:13 ESV] For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh,

[Heb 9:14 ESV] how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.

1. Purify our conscience

2. From dead works

3. To serve the Living God. 

Our Hearts, A guilty conscience. 

[1Jo 3:19 NIV] This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence:

[1Jo 3:20 NIV] If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.

[1Jo 3:21 NIV] Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God

[1Jo 3:22 NIV] and receive from him anything we ask, because we keep his commands and do what pleases him.

[1Jo 3:23 NIV] And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us.

[1Jo 3:24 NIV] The one who keeps God's commands lives in him, and he in them. And this is how we know that he lives in us: We know it by the Spirit he gave us.

Christ is the Mediator of the New Covenant. 

[Heb 9:15 ESV] Therefore 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.

A Will ain’t no good unless the person has died.

[Heb 9:16 ESV] For where a will is involved, the death of the one who made it must be established.

[Heb 9:17 ESV] For a will takes effect only at death, since it is not in force as long as the one who made it is alive.

Sealed with blood. 

[Heb 9:18 ESV] Therefore not even the first covenant was inaugurated without blood.

[Heb 9:19 ESV] 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,

[Heb 9:20 ESV] saying, "This is the blood of the covenant that God commanded for you."

[Heb 9:21 ESV] And in the same way he sprinkled with the blood both the tent and all the vessels used in worship.

[Heb 9:22 ESV] Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.

Why blood?  

Blood means something had to die for sins.  

The Bible also tells us the life is in the blood. 

[Lev 17:11 NIV] For the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one's life.

Doesn’t that make God like an outdated deity?  

Reminder:  God is Holy, Just & Eternal.   

You and I are unholy and full of injustice, unless it is committed against us. 

When we do one little, teeny tiny sin.  (That statement is putrid evil)

A sin is always against the Holy, Just & Eternal God of the Universe. 

The punishment MUST fit the crime.  It’s only Fair. 

[Heb 9:23 ESV] 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.

Jesus Offered Himself at the Real Temple in Heaven. 

[Heb 9:24 ESV] 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.

No Yo-Yo Jesus, Wesleyans 

[Heb 9:25 ESV] Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own,

[Heb 9:26 ESV] 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.

Once for ALL!   

[Heb 9:27 ESV] And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment,

[Heb 9:28 ESV] 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.

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