Sermon: Mediator of A New Covenant

Grab a copy of God's word this morning. We're gonna turn open to the book of Hebrews as we continue our way through that book this morning. Hebrews chapter nine and we're looking at verses 15 through 22 using a pew Bible. It's there on page 1006 of the Pew Bible

thousand and six and Hebrews chapter nine this morning verses 15 through 22.

And let's pray before we open the word together this morning. Let's pray together.

Our Father, we think of the words this morning of those Greeks who approached Philip

and said, we would see Jesus.

Oh that is our great hope this morning that we would see Jesus. Did you open the eyes of our hearts as the apostle said, we might gaze upon the beauty of our savior and throne above.

We now might know

your presence with us.

Really we say that in this room. We are wasting our time if you do not choose to meet with us by your word and spirit. So would you stir in us by your spirit for out your grace? Would you give us a sight of your son

and we pray this in the strong name of Christ Jesus, the only savior of men. Amen. Hebrews chapter nine, verse 15 through 22. This is the holy ander sufficient word of God.

Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant so those who are cold may receive the promised eternal inheritance since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant for where a will is involved the death of the one who made it must be established for will takes effect only at death since it is not in force as long as the one who made it is alive. Therefore not even the first covenant was inaugurated without blood

for when every commandment of the law have been declared by Moses to all the people he took the blood of calves and goats with water and scarlet wool and hiss up and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people saying this is the blood of the covenant that God commanded for you. And in the same way he's sprinkled with the blood, both the tent and all the vessels used in worship. Indeed under the law almost everything is purified

with blood and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins. But the grass withers and the flower fades, the word of God is forever. Thanks be to God. Amen.

We're gonna jump right into the text this morning. There are only two points this morning as we approach this text. The first is the covenant fulfilled and the second is the inheritance given the covenant fulfilled and the inheritance given. Now to understand this passage before we go into it, what you need to know is that in the Greek and the original Greek text that there is a word that is used multiple times in that text in our

English Bibles and most of you're reading the sv, but it's true in most of your English translation of the Bible is they take that one Greek word and they translate it in two different ways. In the text, this one Greek word can mean either covenant and so you will see that in your text, part of the text. That same Greek word can also mean will or testament, meaning someone's last will, someone's last testament. And so in your English Bibles, e S V, if you're using that this morning,

almost every other that you're using, it will translate that same word rightfully in two different ways. The apostle is referring to both of those things as he speaks and as he's speaking about both of those things, covenant, last testament or last will, he's tying both of those things to the idea of death. And so we're going to look at that this morning. He begins with covenant in verse 15, our first point this morning,

the covenant fulfilled now when one entered into a covenant, most covenants in the scriptures and then most that we see even in the ancient near East, there was on the one side the promise of blessing and on the other side the promise of cursing. That is if you abided by the covenant, there was promise of blessing. If you broke the covenant, there was the promise of cursing and the great sign or picture that we get of this,

the most clear picture I think is the picture that we have in the covenant that God enters into with Abram in Genesis 15. If you think about that covenant that God enters into with Abram in Genesis 15, he tells Abram to take different animals. He is to divide those animals in two, he is to put one part of the animal on the right, one part of the animal on the left, and then he is to keep doing that with the animals and making a straight line.

And as this was the practice in the ancient near East, then the two parties of the covenant would then walk through those divided animals and as they passed divided animal after divided animal after divided animal, they were making a promise to one another that if either one of them broke that covenant, the promise they were making, if they broke it, they were to be divided. Like that animal was divided. They were to be rent A under, they were to die,

they were to be broken. You'll see this throughout the Old Testament that as people

uh, disobey the covenant, that God has entered into them with them, you will see that often there is judgment that comes upon them. Now the writer's initial point is to relate death with the idea of covenant verse 15. Therefore he meaning Jesus is the mediator of a new covenant so that those who are cold may receive the promised eternal inheritance as a death has occurred that redeems him from the transgressions, Christ's death paid the price for violating

the old covenant. Even as it is the genesis for the new covenant, it paid the price for the old covenant for the violation of the old covenant. Even as it is the genesis or the inauguration of the new covenant, he ties these two things together in our texts. Old covenant paid for new covenant inaugurated and the author is clear, he's being crystal clear to us. There is no hard fast break between the old covenant and the new covenant. Despite some teachers you've heard,

despite some whole teachings of theology and doctrinal camps within the evangelical world have taught this. Though you may have heard preachers along these lines,

discontinuity is not his emphasis here. He's emphasizing continuity. Continuity between the old covenant and the new covenant. The new does not radical is not radically different from the old, but rather it is the fulfillment of the old. It's its fulfillment how by the death of Christ that's his point by the death of Christ,

you will often hear people say, maybe it's rattled around in your brain thought, ah, how are, how are people in the Old Testament saved? How was it that they were ever reconciled to God? And the answer is, by the death of Christ, it's by Christ the death of Christ secured redemption for all before and all after who looked to him either in anticipation before or as Jesus says at the Lord's table in remembrance after his sacrifice,

his sacrifice alone say no other sacrifice will do it. But of course you should start having questions fire in your head. You might think, well the people in the Old Testament that are offering all of these sacrifices, didn't those sacrifices do anything? God commanded them to offer sacrifice after sacrifice after sacrifice. Yes, it's very true and the people were covered over and they were made clean by that sacrificial bud blood.

But if we look just a little bit further in the book of Hebrews, he makes it crystal clear for you and I. So if you go over to chapter 10, verse 14, the writer says this, for it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. Again, just a few verses later. Chapter 10 verse 11. And every priest stands daily at disservice offering repeatedly the same sacrifices which can never take away sins. Wait, they're offering all of these sacrifices.

Do they mean nothing Will our verse makes it very clear it provides the solution. All the sacrifices before anticipated and pointed forward to the blood of Christ shut upon the cross as the one lasting securing eternal sacrifice for sin. As one theologian hopefully put it, the blood of Christ is the blood upon which the NOIC covenant, the Abrahamic covenant, the mosaic covenant, and the Davidic covenant all depend the blood of Jesus

is the blood of the new covenant in which all these previous administrations find their fulfillment. Covenant is fulfilled

again. Writer makes it clear that salvation has always been from him and through him and to him it alone is in Christ regardless of what time the person lived in. He says in verse 15 that this is true for those who are cold. When has God called people, men and women and children to himself? He's done that since the garden.

He then reflects upon those who were quote redeemed from transgressions committed under the first covenant continuity, the same Christ, the same salvation, the same savior, the same blood, Christ death purchase. Those who were alive in his present day, even while it reached forward to our day, even while it reached backwards to the days of all those that have come before. When he died upon that cross, he died in that moment for the thief on the cross that was right next to him.

Even as he died in many of us in this room are saved by that death. Even as he died for Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Sarah and Rachel and Esther and Job,

they believed in him and were saved by him. There is only one way, one truth, one life. Jesus said, I am the way, I am the way and the truth and the life. And no one, no matter time, no one comes to the Father except through me. It's the fulfillment, everything fulfilled in him. And because it has been fulfilled in him, it is necessarily final.

I was in college, I grew up in Illinois. I went to a university in Illinois. My uh degree was in history with secondary education. And so to become a teacher of history in the state of Illinois, you had to take a Illinois history class. So our Illinois history teacher brought in a guest speaker one day. Uh, you may not know this, but before Joseph Smith had the great vision that Salt Lake City was the promised land of God, he before thought the promised land was Navoo,

Illinois. Uh, and when they were persecuted there, then all of a sudden he had a new vision. Let's go out west further, uh, to Salt Lake City. And so this history professor had a Mormon elder to come into our Illinois history class to present on the history of Mormonism and to tell us about it. And I'd only been a Christian for a year or so and I remember that Mormon elder getting up and telling us about the history of

Mormonism. And then he said this line, he said Judaism came first and Christianity built upon Judaism. But that wasn't all. There was more to come and Mormonism builds upon Christianity. More was needed.

I was racked. I didn't know what to do with that.

Do I have all that I need? Is this, is this really it Christ was there more revelation to come, was more actually needed?

No, he sent his son, he can't send anymore. He is the final revelation of God. He is a very yes and the amen of God. He is the final word. There are no more covenants, there are no more promises, there are no more words of revelation. He came in the flesh and he suffered and he died for sinners. Even as he set upon the cross, as he has laid out with some of his final words, it is finished

and indeed it was finished.

Covenants fulfilled. Second, let us see the inheritance given in verses 16 and 17. He uses this Greek word again, but this time most of our English Bible is rightfully translated differently. The word here is not as covenant. It is not covenant. But you will see in most of your bibles is either will or testament or maybe both of those words as in one's last will, one's last testament. And the writer is making a point.

An inheritance has been given but an inheritance is only given because of of what has occurred as with any will so is true here. This last will and testament comes into effect because there is a death.

Most of us know this. A parent passes away when the parent passes away, the children then then receive the inheritance and the legacy or the inheritance has come because he died. And it's staggering. It is beyond human imagination. It is even beyond human desire. What he leaves as an inheritance, what he gives

it's good leave an inheritance. My my hope is, is that when I pass that I will have some kind of inheritance to give to my children, leave them something but no how matter how vast the estate I leave them and it won't be vast to their chagrin. No matter how vast it's temporal, it's fading, it isn't lasting. Whatever I leave them, it can lose its value. It can be squandered, it can be lost,

but not the inheritance given by Christ after the will went into effect. This inheritance is markedly different. This inheritance is as the writer says in verse 15, it is an eternal inheritance.

I love the illustration. I read that h a a iron side gave when he was going through this passage, he said he knew of a man that had lived in Montana and there were lawyers that were looking for this man for a long period of time. This man was laboring day in and day out in the hot sun of Montana out in the fields. And then finally word came to him that these lawyers were looking for him and they had been looking for him because there had been a British aristocrat that

had died and that British aristocrat had had given his inheritance to this man. And so this man, upon finding this out, he immediately went into town and he went into town and he bought a new suit on credit and then he started out for Great Britain. And as people were coming to him and asking him, where are you going? What are you doing? He said, I'm going to take possession of my estate, going to take possession of my estate.

Dear Christian, you are in this world but you're just passing through

and we're just on our way to taking possession of our estate. It's there. It's not here.

You have stored or you above. As the author says, an eternal inheritance

often think about this in weeks when life is hard. Uh,

it was like, oh, the devil and his dominion are bringing things and the world is bringing things and my flesh is bringing things and sin is bringing things and my body is failing in ways like all of these, all of these pressures that are coming to bear. And they, they want to take everything away and they attempt to take everything away, but they can't take everything away. They take almost everything away but not everything.

And in fact, whatever loss I suffer here is gained there. They can't take everything away because it is an eternal inheritance that has already been secured and already been given. None can take it from me. It was purchased, it was provided at great cost. It is an inheritance and I will receive it.

So will you if you are in Christ who will receive it

because it has been secured by death.

That's the point of verses 18 through 20 is mine goes to the old covenant. He has been contrasting the old with the new throughout this section of the book. And as the writer points out in the old covenant, nothing was sanctified without blood. The blood coming from an animal that had been slaughtered thus no longer having life had to be sprinkled upon the book that blood and it had to be sprinkled upon the people to cleanse them.

And then it was even taken into the holy holies and it was sprinkled upon the mercy seat. And just as a side point, this is why our primary mode of baptism is that we sprinkle

all the shedding of blood was but a type. It's a type that is pointing forward to the blood that was to be shed by the lamb without blemish. You see, even as the people and as the book and as the holy of Holies needed to be cleansed, there had had to be death. The writer boldly says, the same is true of us. Verse 22, without the shutting of blood, there is no forgiveness of sin.

But with the shutting of blood is secured for us by his blood. That which is eternal and lasting and full and complete an inheritance that is great and beyond measure

purchase simply by his blood.

By his blood.

You know the early church is often accused of various things. Um, early Christians were called incestuous was the rumor in the Roman empire cuz we called each other brother and sister and they would greet each other with a holy kiss. They're incestuous. Early Christians were called atheists because they wouldn't bow down to the range of deities and especially to the emperor atheists.

One of the most intriguing is that early Christians were often accused of being cannibals cannibals because they were obsessed with blood and they would meet together in their private gatherings in worship and they were said to gather together to eat the body and to drink the blood of their savior of the one they worshiped.

We are a people obsessed with blood,

obsessed with it. It's weird.

Christians are weird.

Not primarily weird because of your views of sexuality or marriage, though that's becoming increasingly weird in our society.

You're weird more than any other reason because of your obsession with blood.

We talk about being washed in blood.

We talk about being cleansed by blood. We even sing about blood.

There's a fountain filled with blood drawn from emmanuel's veins and sinners. Plunge beneath that flood, lose all their guilty stains

or obsessed with this blood because of the power of that blood.

They're dying. Lamb, my precious blood shall never lose its power. All the ransom ones of God be saved to sin no more. There's power in this blood

when this poor lisping taine tongue lies silent in the grave and an in a nobler sweeter song I'll sing a power to save it was was no life like this life. So there's no death like this death. There's no blood like this blood.

There's power in this blood. Just listen to these Bible verses Christ's blood propitiate. That is it satisfies the wrath of God. Romans 3 25, God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith. Christ's blood redeems. Ephesians one, seven In him we have redemption through his blood. Christ's blood cleanses consciences. Hebrews nine 14. How much more will the blood of Christ to through the eternal spirit offered

himself without blemishing God purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God. Christ's blood purifies one John one, seven, the blood of Jesus, his son purifies us from all sin. Christ's blood reconciles. Ephesians two 17. Now in Christ Jesus, you who are once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. Christ's blood justifies Romans five, nine. Since we have now been justified by his blood,

were obsessed with blood because there is power in this blood

as those who are forgiven that belong to God and only those are forgiven who belong to God and only those who are covered with the blood of Christ. Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness. Truly. In a real sense, this is all that matters.

This is all that matters. Yes, you and I are to live our lives loving the Lord with all of our hearts, soul, mind and strength. Yes, you and I are to present our bodies as a living sacrifice wholly and acceptable to him. Were to do that each day, let alone each hour after hour. But in one very real sense, it's his blood alone that matters.

It is not your giving to the poor. It is not your kindness. It is not your patience. It is not your virtue as a mother or a father or your knowledge of doctrine or theology or your service as an usher or a Sunday school teacher or a deacon or an elder or a pastor. In one very real sense, none of it ultimately matters apart from if you are covered with the blood of Christ.

That's what matters.

Or as John said, of those who came outta the great tribulation, revelation seven, that they were washed white with the blood of the lamb. It is only here that there is forgiveness.

It's only here that you receive an eternal inheritance.

And the only way to be covered by this blood is to be united to the sacrificial Christ by faith.

An inheritance you can't work for,

you can't barter for an inheritance.

You can't trick your way into an inheritance. An inheritance is something that's just, it's given and you just receive it.

And the only way to receive this inheritance is by faith. The only way, without faith you are without Christ. And without Christ, you are without Christ's blood. And without Christ's blood, you are without God. And without God, you are without eternal life. But if you have faith, you have Christ. And if you have Christ, you have his blood. And if you have his blood, then you have God. And if you have God, you have eternal life.

This passage, it has a lot to say about death.

It's focused on Christ's death. But you and I, we have to reckon with another death.

And that's our death.

I wanna give you one fact and ask you one question in closing this morning. One fact or truth and one question,

one truth is this. We're all dying.

It's not what we often say. We often say we're all going to die. That's too easy to say. That's too easy.

We're all dying.

You are dying. I'm dying.

You have less minutes of your earthly life since you walked in that door than you did before you walked in that door.

You have less hours on this earth than you did this morning.

Death is not a respecter of persons. You can't out flank it. You can't run far enough from it. You can't trick it. You're dying.

I'm dying. That's fact. You remember that in the days and the weeks ahead would you we're all dying.

That's fact. Now the question, here's the question, has your death lost its sting by virtue of his death

as your death lost its sting by virtue of his death?

That doesn't have to hold you. It's been defeated. The penalty's been paid, he died payment in full and an inheritance has been secured. There is forgiveness readily at hand. But the only way to receive that for yourself, for it even to be true this morning, it can be true for you this morning if you just receive him by faith,

has your death, your inevitable death, lost its sting by his sacrificial death.

If so, as Thomas Watson once wrote, A believer at death will be the happiest loser and the happiest gainer. He will lose his sins. He will gain glory. Have an inheritance

figure. As a preacher, I get um, I get the right to reuse good illustrations every once in a while. So I haven't used this one for a few years. It's one of my favorite. So if you heard it, you'll have to bear with me. But it often goes through my mind when I'm thinking about death. An illustration that Donald Gray Barnhouse told, uh, the famous preacher of 10th Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia in the earliest 20th century

said that his wife had died and he had small children and they were driving back from the funeral and the children were in the backseat having just lost their mom. And he was trying to think about how to comfort them. And he said as he was thinking upon it, and they were driving in the car, a moving van, a big truck went by them. Now, as that truck went by them, the shadow of that truck fell upon the car and it kind of moved

across the front seat and over the back seat. And he said, so I asked my children, I said to them, would you rather be hit by the truck or by the shadow of the truck? And the exclamation from the backseat was, oh daddy much be rather hit by the shadow of the truck because it can do us no harm at all. Said, oh, do you not know, 2000 years ago, Christ

received a truck of death and was run over so that you and I might only go through the valley of the shadow of death.

He got trucked over

you. And I don't.

The moment,

the moment our eyes close in death, if you are in Christ moment, they close in death. They're open to see the glory of your savior face to

the valley of the shadow of death.

That's your inheritance. It's yours.

If you're in Christ, let's pray.

Our Father, we are thankful that there are not many ways to you.

There is not salvation in one age that is different from another. And we wonder whether we are caught in between or there is more to come that we don't know, but that there is one Lord, there's one savior. There is one faith. There's one means for the forgiveness of sins all fulfilled in our Lord, in our Savior Christ Jesus.

Ah, I pray for every soul in this room. We would all know what it means to be washed in the blood of the lamb, to have the forgiveness of sins, and to be recipients of that eternal unfading inheritance. Pray this in the strong name of Christ. Amen.