Transcript

Years ago as a young seminary student, I worked on the custodial staff of the school. When classes were over, I changed my clothes and began cleaning the bathrooms. By the time I finished that evening, the sinks and the faucets were scrubbed, and the floors were mopped. But the truth is, it was a job much like that of everyone today who cleans the home, the closet, and the kitchen sink. After hours of scrubbing and cleaning, you know in the back of your mind, “I’m going to have to do this all over again tomorrow.”

Cleaning is a job that is never done. The dirt and the clutter and the dust find their way back quicker than you can say, “Finished!”

Well, as we set sail today into the tenth chapter in the book of Hebrews, that is the point the author begins to make. He is reminding these Hebrew believers—Jewish people who trusted in Christ and were now struggling with doubts at best and persecution at worst—that living under the old covenant was a system in which you could never say, “Finished.” There were always more sacrifices to make, more observances to perform, more seasons and festivals to keep.

But while under the Old Testament covenant of law, the sacrifices never ended, there is indeed an end in sight. And that is because something happened in God’s timing, in human history.

This chapter opens with the author of Hebrews reminding his readers in verse 1, that the Old Testament law, with its sacrifices and rituals, was never God’s final plan. He calls these sacrifices and rituals “but a shadow of the good things to come.”

Now it takes a source of light to create a shadow, and the coming Messiah, the Lord Jesus, was the light of the world.

In the meantime, under the law, the same sacrifices for sin were repeated year after year, in obedience to God’s plan, but they were never able, as verse 1 tells us, to “make perfect those who draw near.” They could never cleanse sin or remove guilt permanently. They were just a shadow of something permanent still to come.

The writer concludes with a rather blunt statement that would have shocked devout Jewish people in his day: “It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins” (verse 4).

He is saying to these Jewish believers, “If you think there is anything to gain by returning to that system, you are deluding yourselves! God has done away with that temporary system. He has now fully provided for you with a better, permanent sacrifice!”

Beloved, this is all another way of telling us not to put our trust or hope in anyone or anything other than Jesus to remove our feelings of guilt and sin. Nothing else can comfort us in our deepest need and make us able to stand before God in a right relationship with Him.

The writer then does something interesting. He supports his point that animal sacrifices were inadequate by quoting from Psalm 40. This psalm was written by King David, but the writer of Hebrews says the words were spoken by Jesus. Even more interesting, these words are not recorded in the Gospels, and that is because Jesus did not speak them during His public ministry.

He spoke these words to God the Father just before departing the glory of heaven for the womb of a woman on earth. Here is what he said:

“Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired, but a body have you prepared for me; in burnt offerings and sin offerings you have taken no pleasure.” (verses 5-6)

That might sound strange since it was God who commanded all these sacrifices to begin with back in the book of Leviticus. Did He change His mind? He commanded them, but now He does not want them?

Yes, He commanded the sacrifices, but the sacrifices were never His ultimate desire. They were a temporary measure.

Under the old covenant, Israel needed something to make them ceremonially clean enough to draw near to God’s holy presence without being incinerated by the just wrath of God toward their sin. The sacrifices accomplished that cleansing, at least when they were done in faith according to God’s instructions.

The trouble is, the people of Israel began to believe they were doing God a big favor by sacrificing animals and keeping these symbolic rituals. Beware, beloved; it is easy to separate the symbol from true spirituality.

In our own day, people can pray over their meal that God will “nourish their body” without any real desire to give their body to the things of God. Thousands of people will attend a Christmas worship service as one of their traditions, without having any love for Christ.

Samuel told disobedient King Saul, “Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord?” (1 Samuel 15:22).

Here in Hebrews 10, we are told that Jesus offered Himself as the final sacrifice, in complete obedience to His Father. Verse 7 records Him saying, “Behold, I have come to do your will, O God, as it is written of me in the scroll of the book.”

God’s will all along was to replace the entire sacrificial system of the old covenant with the new covenant instituted by Christ. That is what verse 9 means: “He does away with the first [covenant] in order to establish the second.”

Here is the amazing plan of God in human history—to do away with the endless cycle of ineffective sacrifices and make people acceptable before Him. And this was accomplished “through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (verse 10). Jesus has guaranteed our acceptance before God for all eternity. He did what we could never do.

Jesus “offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, [and] he sat down at the right hand of God” (verse 12). He could literally say on that cross, “It is finished.” He did not say, “I am finished”—He was just getting started. But His one sacrifice on the cross finished all that was needed for our eternal salvation.

Then in verses 16-17, the writer quotes the same verses from Jeremiah he quoted back in chapter 8, focusing on two of God’s promises: “I will put my laws on their hearts, and write them on their minds” and “I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.”

Christ’s once-for-all death is fully sufficient to pay for our sins. And when by faith we personally accept His work on our behalf, we enter into the new covenant promises. The Holy Spirit indwells us, and He begins His work inside us, changing us from the inside out. It is no longer rituals; it is a personal relationship with our Lord.

But did you catch that new covenant promise—God will remember our sins no more? That is an amazing statement.

God does not forget anything—He always knows everything at once. So, does this mean God is forgetful? Well, when God says He will not remember our sins, He is effectively saying they do not exist anymore. There is nothing left for Him to deal with. Nothing sinful about you exists that He would need to punish. You are perfectly safe forever.

How? Jesus took your sins upon Himself and then got rid of them forever. His blood literally washed them all away—as far as the east is from the west (Psalm 103:12). They can never come back to haunt you. As the writer says here in verse 14, Jesus has “perfected [us] for all time.”

That is why he can write, “Where there is forgiveness of these [sins], there is no longer any offering for sin” (verse 18). None is needed. Beloved, you have been completely, fully, entirely, eternally forgiven through Christ’s once-and-for-all sacrifice.

He finished the job—and it will never have to be done again.