Hebrews #21: an exposition of Hebrews 9:15-28. This message by Pastor Rod Harris was delivered at Trinity Baptist Church on Sunday morning, September 7, 2014.
Intro:
There is a fountain filled with blood
Drawn from Immanuel’s veins;
And sinners, plunged beneath that flood,
Lose all their guilty stains:
Lose all their guilty stains,
Lose all their guilty stains;
And sinners, plunged beneath that flood,
Lose all their guilty stains.
Have you been to Jesus for the cleansing power?
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?
Are you fully trusting in His grace this hour?
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?
Are you washed in the blood,
In the soul cleansing blood of the Lamb?
Are your garments spotless?
Are they white as snow?
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?
Some are horrified by these images. Some say Christianity is a “slaughterhouse” religion. All this talk of blood and sacrifice. That’s just so primitive, so ancient! We are too sophisticated for such nonsense. Thus some are determined to “protect” God’s image by declaring such notions as the rantings of wild-eyed fundamentalists. They prefer a religion that is less nauseating and more in tune with the finer things of life. God’s role is to lovingly serve humanity. They want no part of a God who is full of wrath and demands an accounting for sin. But the fact is, our faith is a bloody faith. The Old Testament system rests on a sea of blood. The New Testament is clear, Christ came to die. His death was no tragic consequence of mistaken identity or runaway religious fervor, it was the eternal plan and purpose of God. The shedding of His blood, His dying is our only hope. Our text this morning is found in the 9th chapter of Hebrews.
Text: Hebrews 9:15-28
In our text Christ is identified as mediator and testator.
Mediator = one who mediates between two parties.
He is the bridge that brings together God in His holiness and man in his sin.
One of the glorious things about his mediation is that it is both proactive and retroactive.
Proactive in that he paid for our sins.
Retroactive – (9:15) He paid for Israel’s sins! It reaches all the way back to the Garden of Eden.
Testator = one who makes out a will.
Now a will is no good unless someone dies!
You could be listed in a will to inherit $100,000,000, your own Island and a glorious mansion but until the person who has so named you dies – you got nothing!
The writer of Hebrews informs us that Christ died putting the will into effect yet he lives enabling Him to mediate the covenant. He is both the testator and the mediator. The same word is used throughout. In verse 15 it is used in a religious sense thus “covenant.” In verses 16-17 in a legal sense thus “will.”
The biblical writer has been talking about Christ as our great high priest. In the first half of chapter 9 we discovered the glory of the New Covenant is found in the substance of Christ’s death and what that death actually accomplished. This morning’s text follows that same theme. As we work our way through the text we are reminded that…
Thesis: Our blessed hope, as the people of God, is that the blood of Jesus Christ atones for our sin.
There are two (2) things I want to point out in relation to this text.
- The necessity of blood is clearly revealed by the Old Testament system. (9:18-22)
The Law was initiated with blood
The tabernacle was initiated with blood
This underscoring two important truths:- The seriousness of sin
- The cost of forgiveness
- The efficacy of blood is gloriously demonstrated by what Christ has done. (9:23-28)
Just what has the death of Christ accomplished?
The short answer is found in verse 26:
“…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.”
This is made possible because of…
A better sacrifice – 9:23
A better representative – 9:24
A greater power – 9:25-28
And gives us…A greater hope – 9:28b