Hebrews 10:11-25
What do you think of when you hear the word, “Sacrifice?” There are a lot of different ideas that come to mind. With Veteran’s Day this last week, sometimes we think of those who have served in the military. And that is a great definition of sacrifice, people have risked a lot, and been in harm’s way so we can have our great freedoms. With the economy, sometimes we think of sacrifices we have had to make in budgets. Going out to eat might mean pizza or sandwiches instead of steaks. And of course, at some point, our minds go to church. We hear the word, “Sacrifice” a lot while we sit under this roof and between these walls.
But sometimes I think we are a little removed from the impact of what that word means. We are a little disconnected from the history of the sacrificial system, and therefore, we are a little disconnected from how powerful that word really is. I was listening to the radio on my drive home a few months ago, and the DJ was asking people to call in to share family stories. One guy called in laughing because when he was a kid, in the late 70’s, it was really fashionable to have a chinchilla fur coat. And this guy recalled that he was impressed at his little sister’s business savvy, because she went out and bought a bunch of these little animals to raise and then sell for their fur.
The day came when the all got full sized and she asked him, “who do I call to come and shave the chinchilla’s?” And he said, “you don’t shave them for their fur, you have to skin them, to kill them and then skin them?” At which point she burst into tears and ran into her room. In an instant, he money making scheme, turned into a money costing scheme, as all of these little creatures went from being cash cows, to pets. The reality was too horrible for her to stomach. And that’s fine. I don’t like thinking about the realities of where my supermarket pork chops come from, or my leather shoes either.
But as we read the Epistle lesson from Hebrews, God is asking us to consider the reality of what a sacrifice really is. And it’s not pretty. The book of Hebrews was written to a group of Christians that had recently converted from Judaism, so when the writer speaks about comparing Jesus to the Old Testament sacrifices, the readers instantly, “got” what he was saying. We maybe need to revisit some of these things so we can get a better grasp on it too. My prayer for us is that this journey would be horrible. That in better understanding the horror of the sacrificial system, we would better appreciate the seriousness of our sin, and what atonement actually costs. But also that we would better appreciate what it mean to have Jesus be our ultimate joy and sacrifice, and live out our gratitude for what He has done for us.
So let’s get started with the reading: And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. Let’s start with the first part of this sentence. In the Old Testament times, you would not have wanted to be an Altar Guild Member. You thought the occasional wine stains, and candle wax was bad! In those days there were constant animal sacrifices happening at the Temple. 24 teams of priests stood at the ready, and they were all busy! There were daily sacrifices in the morning and in the evening. In addition to these, there were the weekly Sabbath sacrifices. And of course, there were the yearly sacrifices for all of the annual festivals and commemorations throughout the year. And these are only the group sacrifices, don’t even get me started on the sacrifices that individuals would come to the temple to make. There were Burnt offerings, Fellowship offerings, Guilt Offerings, Sin Offerings, and Grain Offerings. And besides this last one, the one thing they all had in common was BLOOD. And lot’s of it.
The Temple was a gruesome and grizzly place to be, and we don’t think about this often enough. Animals were always being slaughtered, and their blood drained out. Because the blood represented the very life of that animal, and it was the lifeblood that had to be used in the sacrifice. God’s covenant with his people was sealed in blood in Moses day: God promised to their God, and they promised to follow him, and a sacrifice marked the importance of that covenant:
(Moses) rose early in the morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel. 5 And he sent young men of the people of Israel, who offered burnt offerings and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen to the LORD. 6 And Moses took half of the blood and put it in basins, and half of the blood he threw against the altar. 7 Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read it in the hearing of the people. And they said, “All that the LORD has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient.” 8 And Moses took the blood and threw it on the people and said, “Behold the blood of the covenant that the LORD has made with you in accordance with all these words.”
So God’s people, covered in the blood of the sacrifice, promise to follow Him. But there’s only one problem. They didn’t keep their promise! So what happens, they need to be covered with sacrificial blood again, and again, and again, when they break the covenant, in order to be restored into their relationship with God. As Hebrews says, the sacrifice didn’t have the power to totally take away sins, it had to be repeated again and again.
And the biggest day of the Jewish Calendar back then, and still today in fact, is the day when this relationship with God was formally renewed: Yom Kippur, literally, the “Day of Atonement.” Again, a day of horrible bloodshed, and violence, and horror. The day started with two sacrifices one for all the people, and one for the high priest. One was a goat, and the other was a bull. Now, guess which one was sacrificed for which? Actually the sacrifice of the Bull was made for the high priest alone, and the goat was sacrificed for the sins of all the people. WHY?
The High Priest had to do something so frightful, and so scary, that he needed all of the blood of the bull to cover him. He had to go, a sinful human being, into the place that no human was allowed to go aside from this one guy, on this one day of the year. The High Priest would dare to walk up the steps of the temple, through the holy place, and take a deep breath and pull back a heavy curtain, and walk into the holy of holies, the physical place where the Name of the Lord, the Glory of the Lord, the Holiness of the Lord lived. A place where NO SIN or SINNER could possibly survive.
So the high priest wearing stoke a hot fire, and throw incense on it so his vision would be clouded, and with trepidation, he would take the blood from the bowl of the sacrifice, and sprinkle it upon himself and before him with his right hand. There would have been blood everywhere. But this was the only confidence the High Priest could have. That God would recognize the blood of the sacrifice, the recognition of the Priests sinfulness, and payment for his sins, and allow this man to enter his presence, enter the most holy place, to go beyond the curtain and live. So in the midst of this blood soaked horrible scene, we witness the beauty of God’s mercy toward sinners. That the sins of man, could be placed upon another, upon a beast that would shed its own blood in place of the sinners.
But the work of the priests was never finished. Year after year, week after week, day after day, sacrifices had to be made. As Hebrews stated, “Every Priest STANDS DAILY at his service” because sacrifices had to be made over and over again, as people broke the covenant over and over again, and the relationship with God needed to be restored over and over again. The sacrificial system was a blessing, but it was never meant to be the last word in God’s plan to reconcile his people unto himself. We get a picture of this as we read further in our passage.
But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet. For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.
And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us; for after saying,
“This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, declares the Lord:
I will put my laws on their hearts and write them on their minds,”
then he adds, “I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.”
Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin.
God’s plan for reconciling his people to himself was never meant to stop at the sacrifice of bulls, and goats, and sheep, or any other animal, or any sacrifice that would need to be repeated over and over again. God’s ultimate plan was to defeat sin and its consequences once and for all, with one ultimate and final sacrifice. God’s ultimate plan was to make the fearsome enemy of sin, into a bearskin rug, into a footstool, by bringing about a new blood covenant with his people, an eternal covenant. But there is only one thing. To bring about a new and greater covenant, would require a new a greater blood sacrifice. A sacrifice so huge, so powerful, so perfect that no one could provide it. So God himself would provide this one.
And on Christmas Day, 2000 years ago, in a little town in Bethlehem, God did just that. The ultimate and final sacrifice for sins was born. A baby, God’s own son, fully man, and yet fully God came into this world in order to bear the sins of the world. Now you begin to see the unspeakable horror, the stunning shock, of Christ’s mission. He came to cover us with his own blood. He came to be the punishment for sins, in our place. He came to suffer the justice, and the wrath of God on our behalf. He came to be the sacrifice of sacrifices. And that is exactly what he did. It’s what his whole life was about.
And a Sacrifice it was. As Jesus was beaten, and torn apart by whips and fists and crowns of thorns, his blood, his life giving blood, flowed from his body. As Jesus was pierced for our transgressions with nails of cold iron, his blood, his life giving blood spilled out. A horrible scene that not one of us could bear to watch. But this bloody scene is also beautiful. For in the midst of this violence, and horror, we see the love God has for his people, the love God has for you and for me. That he would give everything, that there is nothing he would hold back, in order to make us His.
Something important happened when Jesus died. He breathed his last on the outskirts of town, on a cross, in a place of dishonor, outside the city gates. But in the middle of the city, in the middle of the temple, a loud ripping sound pierced the silence. The curtain that separated the Holy of Holies was torn in two from top to bottom. And with it, the old Covenant. No longer would access to the presence of God be limited to one High Priest, Once a Year. No longer would men have to fear and cover themselves with the blood of animals in order to come close to God. A new entry way to heaven was opened up. Not through a curtain, or a building, but through the very body and blood of Christ himself.
So now, we have a gift. We have confidence to stand before God. Not because of us, but because of the sacrifice Christ made for us. We read in Hebrews: Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. We have been washed clean with the blood of Christ’s sacrifice, we have been washed clean and connected to that sacrifice in the pure waters of Holy Baptism.
But let us never forget the cost. Let us never take for granted the horror that has won us so great a gift. The Blood that has cleaned us of every stain. The life given, in place of ours, and the resurrection that is also ours because of God’s grace. When we remember these, we realize that there is no such thing as cheap grace. It cost God everything, and yet it is absolutely free to us! How are we to respond to this gift of grace and forgiveness and salvation?
We read on: Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.
We don’t respond to God’s grace by sitting down, and kicking up our feet and saying, “I’m glad I don’t have to worry about that anymore!” Not at all. We hold fast to our confession of hope. We proclaim the Gospel of Christ, we trust in God’s ongoing promise to love us and to be with us, by sharing with others the hope that is also theirs in Christ. In response to God’s grace we love one another by worshipping God together, and responding to God’s goodness and service to us by serving others. We respond to God’s love by loving others.
But we do it for totally different reasons than they did so many years ago in Old Testament Times. We are blessed that we don’t serve God in order to atone for our sins, or in order to win God’s favor. We serve God because we KNOW that he HAS ALREADY paid for our sins, he HAS ALREADY made us his Children, he HAS ALREADY given us the promise of standing in his presence in the holy of holies for all eternity.
There is nothing left that has to be done. But what we get to do, is love God, and praise God, and love another, as those who have been covered, head to toe with blood.
