The Living Sacrifice
Published by Stanley Pouw in 2024 · 31 March 2024
In Hebrews 10:1-18 we study tonight a most significant Easter passage. Somewhere in England there stood a chapel, and next to it was an arch, and on it was written, “We preach Christ crucified.” For years, godly men preached there, and they presented a crucified Savior as the only means of salvation. But there arose a generation that looked at the cross and found its message too antiquated.
They began to preach salvation by Christ’s example rather than His blood. They didn’t see the necessity of His sacrifice. And ivy crept up the side of the arch, and covered the word, “crucified” and so it said, “We preach Christ.” And the ivy continued to grow until it wiped out the third word. It now read, “We preach.” Paul in Corinth was determined, to know nothing else than Jesus Christ and Him crucified and risen.
This is the depth of what His death meant. Now, the theme of Hebrews is the absolute sufficiency and superiority of Christ over all of the features connected with the Old Testament. The Holy Spirit’s inspired the author. He is presenting to Jews that they can put all of their trust in Jesus Christ, and they don’t need to hang onto the temple services, the priesthood and to the rituals of Judaism.
In Hebrews 9, we learned that a testament demands death, forgiveness demands bloodshed, and salvation demands substitution. And the demand then, for a death that would be superior to all the sacrifices of the Old Testament is laid down in chapter 9. Now, as we come to Hebrews 10, we find the characteristics of the death of Christ, which supply all that was lacking in the Old Testament sacrifices.
All of them had failed because they were unable to satisfy God’s holy demands. Here are the reasons they failed. Number one, they couldn’t bring access to God. And the great cry in the heart of a man was to be in the presence of God. Even the priest at his best on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, could not take the people inside the veil. The veil always remained. They couldn’t bring access to God.
Verse 1, “Since the law has only a shadow of the good things to come, and not the reality itself of those things, it can never perfect the worshipers by the same sacrifices they continually offer year after year.” And what does “perfect” means in Hebrews? It means access to God. Hebrews 7:19 says, “For the law perfected nothing, but a better hope is introduced, through which we draw near to God.”
And, the Old Testament couldn’t do that. The veil always remained. There never was access to God. In verse 1 it says the law was only a shadow and not the very image. It says it was a shadow of good things to come. Now, what are the good things to come? Well, that speaks of the privileges and blessings that came through the sacrifice of Christ. And the law pictured those things.
Access to God and security and power and all of those things were really not there in the Old Testament, but they were pictured there. The old covenant could never bring a man into the presence of God. Without Christ, you can’t get past the shadow of God. And the Jews today who live in Judaism and are so dedicated to Judaism are chasing the shadow of God, and there is no substance.
Oh, how important it is that we point this out to our Jewish friends, that there is no perfection in the Old Testament. And they have also forsaken the sacrifices. They not only do not accept the final sacrifice of Christ, but they fail to continue the sacrifices of the Old Testament. They find themselves standing in limbo between two systems and going through a ritualistic representation of the old.
And, it was said in the Old Testament that anybody who despised the sacrifices was cut off. So God felt that they were very important. As a picture of what was to come, as a reminder of sin, and as something that was externally efficacious to cover their sin so that they could at least maintain an external relationship with God, not the fullness of the indwelling Holy Spirit in our heart which we have now.
Verse 2, “Otherwise, wouldn’t they have stopped being offered, since purified once and for all, they would no longer have any consciousness of sins?” Because once they arrived at perfection it would’ve been unnecessary. Because once purged, they should have had no more consciousness of sins. If sacrifice of lambs would have removed sin, they wouldn’t have the guilt of their sin.
Verse 3, “But in the sacrifices there is a reminder of sins year after year.” It was only temporarily covered. Instead of being able to look at the sacrifice and say, “Wow, I’m forgiven,” they kept looking at the sacrifice and said, “Oh, I’m just as sick as I’ve always been. And I’ve got to go down there again with another lamb.” And so the Old Testament just stood as a reminder that sin was not removed.
The conscience of sin has to do with guilt. There’s a certain amount of guilt that comes with sin. It’s just a system built into you, just like pain is built into you. Where pain reacts to bodily injury, guilt reacts to the injury of your soul by disobedience to God, and it’s a warning system. And they never, in the Old Testament, ever were relieved from that tension of guilt of sin.
The Son of God, Jesus Christ paid all our debts in full. He removed sin and He removed all judgment and with it, He removed the fear of judgment. I don’t live in mortal fear of seeing God eventually, I live in great anticipation because all my sins are covered. They were only external. They never got to the heart of the issue either. They always were on the outside looking in.
Verse 4, “For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and lambs to take away sins.” All that the blood of bulls and lambs could do would was doing an act of obedience that had an external significance. It never got to the heart of the issue at all. It never took away sin. I want to worship You, so I’ll offer a sacrifice.” And God was saying, “On the basis of your works, in response to your faith, I accept that.”
The Levitical sacrifices possessed, by God’s design, an efficacy to remove an outward ceremonial defilement, but they never got inside to change a man’s nature and reverse that moral trend. Ezekiel said there’s coming a day when God is going to change you, when He’s going to take away that stony heart of you and He’s going to give you a heart of flesh, and He’ll pour His Spirit upon you.
Verse 5 - 6 say, “Therefore, as He was coming into the world, He said: You did not desire sacrifice and offering, but You prepared a body for Me. 6 You did not delight in whole burnt offerings and sin offerings.” This is Christ talking to the Father before He entered the world. God didn’t like it. Because they took something that should’ve been a symbol of faith and they turned it into a ritual where there was no faith.
Animal sacrifices were ineffective for three reasons. They couldn’t bring access to God. They couldn’t remove sin. And they were always external. The ineffectiveness of animal sacrifices is now compared to the effectiveness of Christ’s sacrifice, and we’ll see that from verse 5 through verse 18. Here he contrasts the tremendous effectiveness of what Christ did to this old system.
Verse 5 says, “Therefore, as He was coming into the world, He said: You did not desire sacrifice and offering, but You prepared a body for Me.” Christ’s sacrifice was effective because, it was God’s will all along. In the mind of God, before the world was ever created, God knew that the old system wouldn’t cut it. And in His mind, He had planned that Jesus would have to come and die.
Verse 7, “Then I said, “See it is written about Me in the scroll. I have come to do your will, God.” This is a pre-incarnation conversation with God. And so God had formed a body for the Son. So God willed a holy humanity. This is an indication of the virgin birth that Jesus was not born of an earthly father. God prepared a body in Mary. He didn’t need a father. God can do anything He wants.
Verse 8 - 9, “After He says above, You did not desire or delight in sacrifices and offerings, whole burnt offerings and sin offerings (which are offered according to the law), 9 He then says, See, I have come to do Your will. He takes away the first to establish the second.” It’s trying to tell you the old is done away, the new has come, you see. The old didn’t do it. God planned it all along.
The Jews were always accusing the Christians of bringing in some heresy, and so they always related to Old Testament passages. Remember what John 1:17 says? “The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.” And so Christ’s sacrifice was better, because it replaced the Old Testament. It was better because it sanctifies the believer, so it makes the believer holy.
Verse 10, “By this will, we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all time.” Whose will? The will of God, that sent Christ. By what Christ did in response to the will of God, “we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” You know that when Jesus died on that cross and you put your faith in Him, you became sanctified.
God’s will is that He wants you to be sanctified, set apart, not only positionally but practically. In the Greek it is a perfect participle with a finite verb. It shows in the strongest way the permanent, continual state of salvation in which the believer exists. It’s talking about permanence. “By which will we are sanctified.” When you have a perfect participle and a finite verb, you can’t lose your salvation.
You shall remain positionally holy forever because as God sees you, He sees not your righteousness but Christ’s righteousness in your behalf, because you believed. But practically, you’re hurting. And God’s will is that we be practically holy to match that position. And you can’t be holy by works. You can work your head off, but you’re not going to get holy, you’ll just get tired.
Verse 11-12, “Every priest stands day after day ministering and offering the same sacrifices time after time, which can never take away sins. 12 But this man, after offering one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God.” Christ’s sacrifice is better because it removes sin. How many sacrifices? One sacrifice for sins forever. He was done, so He sat down.
In verse 10, the priests were always standing up because they never got done. And in verse 12, “Jesus sat down on the right hand of God.” Theirs was the position of a servant. His was the position of a king. “Daily ministering and offering often the same sacrifices.” Verse 12, “He had offered one sacrifice.” Another contrast, verse 11, “it can never take away sins.” The sacrifice of Jesus was effective forever.
Verse 13, “He is now waiting until his enemies are made His footstool.” Christ’s sacrifice was effective because it destroyed His enemy. All the sacrifices in the Old Testament didn’t do a thing to get rid of Satan. When Jesus rose again from the cross, He dealt a death blow to all of His enemies. And when He descended into the prison where the fallen angels were kept, He declared His triumph over them.
Verse 14, “For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are sanctified.” And here again is the security of the believer, eternal forgiveness. He didn’t perfect us until we next sin. He didn’t bring us into access with God until we blew it and deserved to get kicked out. “For by one offering” He brought us into God’s presence “forever.” There is no way that a believer can lose that forgiveness.
“Shall we sin that grace may abound? God forbid.” “How shall we that are servants of Jesus Christ yield our members as servants of unrighteousness?” What do you think you’re doing? Don’t you know you should be dead to sin? If you’re really a believer, you will try not to have that desire. And so there is a permanent state of completeness in salvation brought about by one act of Christ.
Verse 15-16, “The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. For after He says: 16 this is the covenant I will make with them after those days, the Lord says, I will put my laws on their hearts and write them on their minds.” The sacrifice of Christ is effective because it fulfills the promised New Testament. God said, “I’m going to bring a new covenant.” And when Jesus died, He sealed the New Testament.
Remember, the covenants in the Old Testament were always sealed in blood, weren’t they? Jesus died and sealed the new covenant. And the writer, in verse 15, begins to quote from Jeremiah 31 again. And Jeremiah said it would happen, but Jeremiah didn’t say it on his own. He was inspired by the Holy Spirit. Now, do you see what the writer is doing to these Jewish readers?
Verse 17, “And I will never again remember their sins and their lawless acts.” He’s placing these readers in a position where they will have to accept their prophet Jeremiah, and they will accept what the Holy Spirit said through him, and if they do that, they’ll have to accept Christ and the New Testament. If they reject Christ and the new covenant, they also have to reject Jeremiah and the Holy Spirit.
Verse 18, “Now where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer an offering for sin.” It’s forgiven. Don’t go back to the temple and make more sacrifices. You can be saved tonight, without any works, by just believing the one perfect sacrifice of Jesus Christ?” That’s exactly what I’m trying to say. The sacrifice of Christ is effective, forever because it fulfills God’s will. Let’s pray.