Sermon: Perfect Sacrifice

Let's pray before we open God's word up together and hear it, read and preached.

Our Father, we do come before you this morning.

We are in need of setting our foot on solid ground.

We pray that as we turn to the apostles and prophets with Christ, Jesus himself being the chief cornerstone,

we would find that our feet have arrived on solid ground

and amidst all of the change that we have experienced this week and our lives in this world,

we would find that you are the one constant and that it is good to hear from you.

Father, we confess that this is wasted time this morning. If you are not at work in our midst, we pray that you would fulfill your promise and that where we have gathered together that your spirit would be among us and that that spirit would attend to the word as it is read and preached, that we would each as we have need, we would encounter your word

and that we would know that our feet are on solid ground this very day. We pray all of this in the strong name of Christ Jesus. Amen. Hebrews chapter 10 verses one through 10. This is the holy er, sufficient word of God for since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come, instead of the true form of these realities, it can never by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year make perfect. Those who draw near

otherwise would they have not ceased to be offered since the worshipers having once been cleansed would no longer have any consciousness of sins. But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year for it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. Consequently, when Christ came into the world, he said, sacrifices and offerings you have not desired but a body have you prepared for me and burned offerings and sent offerings,

you have taken no pleasure. Then I said, behold, I have come to do your will. Oh God, as it is written of me. In the scroll of the book when he said above you have neither desired nor taken pleasure and sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sent offerings, these are according to the law. Then he added, behold, I have come to do your will. He does away with the first in order to establish the second. And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the

body of Jesus Christ. Once for all though the grass withers and the flower fades, the word of God is forever. Thanks be to God. Amen.

Chapter 10, it's a good place for us to jump back into the book of Hebrews after a little bit of a break, uh, because he is doing some summarizing and some repeating of things that he has already said in the book. So let's set the scene for those of you that are new to U R C and maybe aren't familiar with the book of Hebrews or maybe those of you that have been at U R C and can't remember that we are ever in the book of Hebrews. Uh,

let's reset the scene a little bit this morning. One, we're not exactly sure who wrote the book of Hebrews. There are a number of possibilities, but what we do know is that the writer of the book of Hebrews was a man that knew the Lord Jesus Christ and he knew the Old Testament scriptures and he was writing to Jewish Christians. In fact, many believe and I believe that this is a written form of a sermon, that he is preaching to these Jewish Christians and he is preaching to them

because they are being tempted. They're being tempted to return back to Judaism after they had already accepted Christ. And the reason appears to be this is that they're facing different sufferings in their lives as they are encountering what it's like to be a Christian and they're suffering for their faith and they look on the horizon and they see even more suffering promise for them possibly persecution, possibly even martyrdom.

And so the author of Hebrews is making it clear to them throughout this book that they cannot return to Judaism. Why? As he will point out again in our passage, they now have the substance they had the substance of all that Judaism was looking forward to and what it was pointing forward to. They have Christ of Christ and he's shown them throughout this book up to this point for nine chapters. He has shown them that having Christ is better than anything that

they had before. He has shown them that Christ is greater than the angels. Christ is greater than Moses. Christ is greater than Joshua. Christ is greater than the high priest Aaron. And we shall see today that Christ is the greater sacrifice. He's one sacrifice for all. Our very first point here this morning, our very first verse here, he points out that the law was quote, a shadow of good things to come instead of the true form of these

realities. That is all the commands in the Old Testament. All the rituals, all the sacrifices, all that they went through as part of that cultic practice, the tabernacle on week ago, all of this Jewish faith were but shadows that find their substance in Christ. They represented the reality but they did not accomplish what only the substance could accomplish and now they have that.

Uh, back in the Civil War, the most famous of African American regiments that were recruited by the union was the 54th Massachusetts and the 54th Massachusetts. When they were recruited, they were being trained and they were given these wooden guns and they would march with these wooden guns and they would practice with these wooden guns and they would learn how to, how to handle a gun with these wooden guns. They knew they had not arrived though and they knew that they were not fully

accepted as soldiers in the Union Army until they had the real thing, the substance. The wooden guns pointed forward to the substance. They represented it. The rider of Hebrews is pointed out the foolishness of returning to what was a shadow, what represented the reality come going back to the shadow of the law would've been in his mind absolutely absurd. And it is absurd. It would've been absolutely bonkers for a, a soldier in the 54th Massachusetts to be walking into battle,

marching into battle and yell at his colonel, Hey Colonel Shaw, we don't want these infields. We want our wooden guns back. Hey, you have the substance, you have the very thing itself.

Substance has come Christ, those who want to return back to the old ceremonies and the rights of the old covenant, which were shadows. They've missed it. It all finds its fulfillment in Christ. They've missed it

this morning. When to look at the argument of the writer Hebrews in three ways. The first is the inadequacies of the sacrifices, the second, the benefits of the sacrifices and the th third, the perfect sacrifice or the substance, so the inadequacies of the sacrifices, the benefits of the sacrifices, and then third, the perfect sacrifice, the substance. Why were the sacrifices of the Old Testament inadequate First because no sacrifice was sufficient.

None were sufficient. The rider is noting that this is clearly shown by the constant requirement and need for more. He notes that in verse one. The same sacrifices are continually offered. There was always the need for more, more bulls, more goats, more blood, more. Why was there the need for continually more because they were insufficient. The Old Testament said, experienced as has been said, a measure of atonement, a measure of the remission of sins, but it was incomplete. It was imperfect,

it was insufficient. Second, the sacrifices never cleanse the conscience of the worshiper. They were never completely relieved. He asked this in verse two, otherwise, would they have not ceased to be offered since the worshipers having once been cleansed would no longer have any consciousness of sins? His argument here is absolutely sound. If the worshiper made a sacrifice of this ox or this bull or this goat or this sheep and his conscience was completely cleared

so that he could go on with life, then why was it that he had to continue to offer more and more sacrifices? No, his conscience would be burdened yet again. He would feel the weight of the guilt of a sin. Once again, his conscience would be afflicted once again, the sacrifices were insufficient. In fact, the law reminded them over and over that the sinner is guilty and the blood of bulls and goats could not take away the stain of that guilt because

they would have to offer another one and then another one and another one

or second point. Then what was the benefit of all of these sacrifices? If they were insufficient, why did God command them? Peter has a case to be made here. If there was no benefits, there's a lot of slaughtering of animals. Well, there were benefits

I wanna consider three this morning. First, the sacrifices showed the awfulness of sin. The sacrifices showed the awfulness of sin and we have to begin here. The entire Old Testament cultic system is erected to remind over and over that sin is truly awful.

Sin is no small thing because our God is no small thing.

Our God is a holy God and our holy creator, God has established what is right and what is wrong, what is good and what is evil. He's erected a standard and he himself is that very standard.

He's perfection and we are to be holy even as he is holy. That's the standard. Him and sin is rebellion against this right standard. It's an attempt to remake the standard, to be the determiner of what is right and what is wrong, what is good and what is evil.

By doing this, as you and I do this, we call into question God's very goodness.

But you think back to the garden of Eden with me back in the Garden of Eden, God will create Adam and Eve and then he will put the trees in the middle of the garden and he will say that they are not to eve from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. You remember that Satan in the form of a servant comes and he begins to tempt Adam and Eve and he is tempting them with this very thing. Is God truly good? He does that by getting them to question the standard.

When God said that they could eat of any tree in the garden except one, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, this was right. This was the good standard. This was what they knew and it was good. It had been delivered to them.

They knew good from evil. They were experiencing good God had commanded them to adhere to the good, be fruitful and multiply, have dominion over all the earth. They were to be his vice regents in the world reflecting his image. Everywhere that they went, they knew good and they could identify evil. They knew that to eat from that tree of the knowledge of good and evil was evil. They knew the standard. They weren't ignorant.

Then why was the tree called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil if they already had the knowledge of this is good, that's evil. Why is it called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and they're not supposed to eat from it? Well, they knew good. They had experienced it all their days to that point and they could identify evil, but they had not experienced it.

And the moment they chose to eat from that tree and eat of that forbidden fruit, their eyes were opened to evil and they experienced it and man has never been the same. And the root of that experience, what drove them is that they doubted God's goodness.

They turned into trying to be the determiners of what was good and evil. God said, don't do this, but we know better. He's trying to keep something good from me. I know better.

So what he called evil, they called good and what he called good, they called evil and they chose to eat.

This is the foolishness of sin and why it is no small thing. It is accusing God of not being good as if he wanted to keep good things from us. It is cosmic rebellion. It's a desire to take the place of God, to remove him off of his seat and put us there. And now we're determining this is good, this is evil. This is right, this is wrong. Yes, I know what he said, but this is it. We take the very place of God.

Sin is no small thing because God is no small thing. And the whole cultic practice in the Old Testament was a daily and yearly and monthly and weekly reminder over and over and over that sin is an awful thing.

It's cosmic rebellion. When Moses murdered the Egyptian, he was attempting to be the determiner of life instead of God. When David committed adultery with Bathsheba, he was attempting to deter be the determiner of what was his instead of what God had given him. Sin screams God is not good from every white lie to drunkenness, to rape, to genocide. It's our attempt to unseat him and put ourselves in his place.

The ritual sacrifices reminded the sinner that sin is not small. Second, the sacrifices benefited in that they reminded the worshiper over and over, that they themselves were a sinner. And the writer of Hebrews is making that point in verse three. In these sacrifices, there is a reminder of sins Every year. It's one thing to recognize that sin is awful. It's quite another thing to recognize that I myself am a sinner. It's quite another.

If I was to walk down Grand River this afternoon and stop anyone along the street there and just walked right up to him and I said to him, you are a sinner, almost without a doubt that person would be offended. How dare you?

I've never met anyone that thinks that they're perfect

or maybe I've met very few that think that they're perfect. I've met even less though that think that they're downright bad.

You see, we quiet quieter conscience. What we do is we play the comparison game. I'm not as bad as my sister. I'm not as bad as my neighbor. I'm not as bad as that pop star. I'm not as bad as this movie actor. And if all else fails, I'm not as bad as Gingis Kahan. And then there's always Adolf Hitler out there. I'm not as bad as him. I'm pretty good.

Remember my freshman year of college I was an about atheist, came to saving faith somewhere that year and I can remember having a conversation after I'd become enamored with Christ. I don't know if I was a Christian yet or not. You'll gather that from the story. I remember sharing Christ with all the people on my dorm floor and I remember one young man saying to me after I'd shared Christ with him, he said, Jason, how are you different now that you're a Christian? And I said,

well, I'm not really much different. I've always been pretty good.

I just love Christ my everlasting shame. What? Ignorance, stupidity. There is none Who does good? No, not even one.

I'm a sinner. Ask my wife, she'll tell you. Ask my kids. They'll tell you. Yes. The staff I work with, they'll tell you. You ask the elders, whoever oversee me, they'll tell you You're a sinner.

Every single one of us.

Yeah, most people think they're pretty good.

The law God instituted it had built into it this, this continual reminder not just of the awfulness of sin but the individual worshiper as they came week in and week out and monthly and yearly, they had to reckon with the fact that I, myself, I am a sinner over and over and over. The conscience was to be continually pricked. This was one of the blessings of the sacrifices even as it was one of the cursings, it was a blessing because we are so creative

and God knows it, we find all kinds of ways of pushing down and distancing ourselves and marginalizing our conscience that that feeling of guilt. We, we will do it all kinds of ways. We will do it by drinking. We will do it by drugs. We'll do it by investing ourselves in work or in our family. We will do it by taking naps in our day and age. We will do it by binge watching Netflix or binge gaming.

We can do it in recreation. We especially like to do it in this victim culture by blaming our circumstances and blaming our environment and our limitations and the sufferings we've experienced. It's always someone or something else's fault. And this goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden. She made me do it. Blame anything in anyone but take responsibility myself. And that's how I quiet my conscience.

But here's the problem,

history and experience have shown over and over again that whatever we employ to quiet, the conscience is insufficient. We move from thing to thing and we go down this road and we think it will quiet the conscience and we realize it's a dead end. So we jump over to this thing and it ends up being a dead end.

It doesn't work.

And the writer is pointing that out in verse two. The sacrifices themselves did not quiet the conscience. Rather they inflamed the conscience. They would know and they would know and they would know that they themselves were sinners. There's a benefit to that. Ah, but there is a weight to that, an awful weight to that.

So third

sacrifices were a benefit because they pointed to the need for something better and that's the writer's main point. They were a shadow pointing to the substance, the sacrifices. They were never meant to be an an end in themselves. That wasn't where it was supposed to stop. The scriptures are clear that this is not new with with this writer of Hebrews. This is a testimony throughout the scriptures over and over again. God says that sacrifices are insufficient. As an example,

Isaiah one 11 through 13, what to me is the multitude of your sacrifices says the Lord. I've had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of well fed beast. I do not delight in the blood of bulls or lambs or of goats. God will go so far as to say, bring me no more vain offerings. I don't want them enough.

Law was a shadow.

It was there as a tutor. It was a teacher that as they did this over and over and over and they're wrestling with this guilty conscience, they had to keep thinking there is something better, there is something more. And it was pointing them forward. The tutor

was pointing them to the substance.

Something more was needed. And every Jew knew the Old Testament sacrificial system did not assuage guilt. There's a reason that Jews don't offer sacrifices today

'cause it doesn't do anything. Ultimately,

this is why even Father Abraham, Jesus said, long to see my day. Why did he long to see the day of Jesus? Because he's the substance.

Our final point, Jesus, as the substance is the perfect sacrifice for sinners, the perfect sacrifice for sinners.

And listen, you gotta sit up and hear this. You're a sinner.

You need the perfect sacrifice for sinners

to clinging, to,

to clinging, to where do you turn?

The writer of Hebrews takes them to the substance.

He's telling them, look, throw away those wooden play things you had before. It's goofy to go back to them. You have Christ. This is what you face your enemy within and without with Christ. This is what your comfort is, Christ. This is the way that you ultimately everlastingly, have peace in your conscience Christ. This is how you are reconciled to God and made one with him forevermore Christ. This is how you're able to walk in this world and live in this world

and be transported to the next Christ. You have him, the substance has come.

It gives us this fascinating text, this conversation verses five through seven. It's between the son and the father. And what's so fascinating, it's, it's a quote from David or Psalm 40 and the writer Fes takes these words of David and he puts them in the mouth of the son. And this is the sons speaking to the father. This is the son's heart. This is the son's will. This is the son's affection and desire as he converses

with the father. Sacrifice and offerings you have not desired but a body you have prepared for me in burnt offerings and sin offerings. You have taken no pleasure. Then I said, behold I have come to do your will. Oh God, as it is written of me. And the scroll of the book, the second Adam, the son of God comes down from heaven and he refuses to doubt his father's goodness. He commits to do his will

is going to do his will. What he says is right is right. What he says is good is good. What he says is evil is evil. Commits to do his, his will.

He trusts and he knows his father is good.

He says a body was prepared for in verse five, verse 10, he makes it clear again that Christ had a body. He becomes flesh according to the will of the Father for us. And then he offers his body as a sacrifice on the cross for us. The perfect sacrifice,

A sacrifice that's once for all one sufficient to to quiet every conscience, one sufficient to atone for every sin. One sufficient to be the savior of all.

Why? Why? Why after all of those goats and all of those bulls and all of the sheep and all of those turtle dubs, why is it now this one sacrifice does what all of those were insufficient to do? Why is it that you must run to the foot of the cross and the sacrifice that was on that tree? Why must you run there and not to anything else?

Why

the early church fathers in the 12th century? Uh, his name was Ansel, one of the great church fathers Anselm will write on this. What is one of the most famous treaties in Christian? Hi history per DEOs Homo. Why the God man? Why the God man?

And he answers it for us. Why we had the need for this divine human mediator.

It's astounding. You're supposed to be astounded verses seven and nine. He does this. He, he uses this word twice. Behold, it's like your mouth drops open. You're supposed to be gaping in awe. This is astounding. Angels in heaven are still astounded. The church triumphant as it worships before his throne, this lamb that was slain and the lion of the tribe of Judah, they are astounded. The only reason that you and I are sitting here and are bored and thinking about

N F L football later today and aren't astounded is because we have too little of you of sin and too little view of God

be astounded.

God became man.

God became man

astounding

comes to live and to die for us so that we might be, as the writer has sanctified, made holy once for all.

Why? Well, why? Why is Jesus the perfect sacrifice? Way in Psalm says this. He says, look, you have to reckon with these two things. You have to reckon with this fact because man had to pay the penalty for his sin that had to happen. You see our God, the God of heaven and earth, he is a just God. He is holy. He is righteous. He must uphold his standard. He can no more deny justice than he can deny himself. It's an impossibility possibility. And frankly, you and I,

we don't want an unjust God. You don't want a sovereign over this universe that is unjust. You want to just God. But here's the problem. It's man's sin. Man must pay the penalty for that sin. God said the wages for sin is death. Those bulls didn't commit the sin. Those sheep didn't commit the sin. Those rams didn't commit the sin. We committed the sin. Man must pay the penalty for his sin. So as we confess in the creed,

the Son of God took to himself a reasonable and true soul and body became man.

God sacrificed God and human flesh so that we might have forgiveness of sins.

Man had to pay the debt. You see, here's the other part of it in Psal says, no mere man could pay the debt. How could that happen? Pay this debt of infinite moral debt that we have because it's committed against an infinite God. We, we have an infinite moral debt. And so how could men pay that debt?

Ah, but he's the God man

and he's infinite

and he pays an infinite price.

He removes the offense of our sin from us and he satisfies the justice of God by offering up himself according to his will.

Sacrifices made. Guilt is removed and God is satisfied. And he says in verse 10, we have been sanctified. It's a finished work.

No more is needed.

No more needs to happen

once for all a done deal finished. This is what Jesus says on the cross. It is finished

accomplished with ongoing benefits for all the eternity.

I'm gonna close this morning

if I can with just pleading with you. Do them.

First of all, for those of you this morning that don't know Christ as your savior,

listen, human history testifies to this.

All the history of humanity testifies to this. And every Christian in this room can testify to this. You can try to satiate your conscience in every possible way. You can dream of quiet your conscience and the conviction that you have, that you are a sinner because you are a sinner.

You can go down any path to try and quiet it and you'll never, ever quieted

apart from Jesus.

You will never have peace outside of Jesus.

You don't wait and you say, ah, I want to get my life together a little bit first. You'll never get your life together. You say, well, I want to make a few sacrifices for him first. I want to do this and I want to do that. No, no, no. He doesn't want your sacrifices. He's been sacrificed for you. And all you have to do is just receive it. He has offered himself for you and you just receive that gift by faith.

Just believe in him and trust that he died for your sin. Just receive.

You have peace forever

to the Christian to plead with you.

Stop turning to other things.

I'll grant you. We're not going in our backyard and offering sacrifices though many of you are raising chickens these days. I don't understand it, but you are. Uh, I hope none of you are doing this. You don't have an altar in your backyard. You aren't offering chickens. But we'll go back to things, old things that we found gave us some measure of comfort before. We'll try new things that give us some kind of peace for a time.

Stop it. Turn to Christ.

You run to Christ again and again and again and again. You find yourself in sin. You run to Christ again. You feel guilty conscience. You run to Christ again. He's not honored by you carrying around guilt

that makes a mockery of the crawls. He sets his people free from a guilty conscience. You find yourself in sin. You repent. You turn back to him and you run to him and you bask in that piece of conscience.

He's given it to you.

He sanctified you. He set you apart. He's made you holy now and for hold of eternity.

He's given it to you.

We have the very substance. Keep

trusting in him. It's the perfect sacrifice who died once for all. Keep trusting in him. Let's pray.

Father, we are thankful

that you are God who upholds justice or thankful that you are not small.

And we are thankful that you provide a way for sinners in the midst of this, for how awful it would be if you were not just

how even more awful it would be if you were not a God of such sweet and generous and gracious salvation.

May each of us sit in this room and stand in this room and our live streaming and sitting in the fellowship hall. May every single one of us know and enjoy what it means to be sanctified by this one, sacrifice for all the very substance Christ.

And we pray this in the strong name of our savior. Amen.