Well, we come back to Hebrews
chapter nine for the fourth time, I think it is, four messages
from this. I want to focus on the last few
verses of the chapter. before we have a break of a couple
of weeks. Verse 27, if any of you have
been listening to me for any time, you know it's a verse that
I quote very often. As it is appointed unto men once
to die, but after this, the judgment. That's such a powerful verse,
because all of us, without exception, have an unavoidable appointment. Old age might take us. Sickness
might take us. Accident might take us. We could
be a victim of crime, violent crime. A natural disaster might
take us. But all of us have an unavoidable
appointment with death. It is appointed to man to die
once, but after this, the judgment. And the call echoes out, prepare
to meet your maker. the old picture of evangelical
religion parading the streets with the boards hung from the
shoulders saying, prepare to meet your maker, prepare to give
an account before the judgment seat of God. We need to be asking
Job's question, another verse that I quote often, how should
a man be just with God? That's in chapter nine and verse
two. How should a man, this is the
problem. How are we going to be right
with God? How should a man be just with
God? You see, many seek peace. Many seek to know that they are
prepared for that unavoidable appointment. Many seek peace
in their religion. in the rites and the liturgies
that go with it, the ceremonies that go with it. Practices that
they think will appease God, make God happy to be lenient,
or turn a blind eye, or sweep under the carpet. Practices to
appease God for sin. The Hebrew believers, to whom
I believe Paul it was that was writing, the Hebrew believers
to whom he's writing were tempted to return to the Old Testament
temple worship because it hadn't at this stage finished. It was
before A.D. 70, I believe. It was before
the Romans destroyed Jerusalem and the temple in A.D. 70. They
were tempted to return because the temple practices, albeit
petering out, fading away, diminishing, they were still going on. They
were physical things. They were tangible things. Animals
were taken. Priests were doing the daily
things that they did. But true worship, as Jesus said
to the woman at the Samaritan well, true worship is in spirit
and in truth, not in patterns and pictures. The patterns and
the pictures, before the reality came, were only intended to point
us and carry us forward to what they pictured. But once the pictures
come, the blueprint has ended. The plan is ended once the building
is habitable. And the gospel building of the
Lord Jesus Christ, the house, as it says in Hebrews chapter
three, that he built, It's come. He has accomplished all things.
Therefore, a return to those Old Testament things to seek
favor with God, to seek the appeasement of God, it's futile, absolutely
futile. Look at verse 23 of chapter nine.
Yes, there were those patterns. And he says, it was therefore
necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should
be purified with this. What's that meaning? Well, if
you look at it in its context, he's just said, without the shedding
of blood, there is no remission of sin. And so therefore, The
patterns of things in the heavens, the patterns of things was the
tabernacle, the temple, the holiest of all, the priesthood, the animal
sacrifices, the shed blood. It was necessary that the pattern
of things, which was pointing to the heavenly reality, that
they should be purified with these, with these what? With
these sacrifices, with the blood of the animals. It was a picture,
but they had to be purified. We've already seen that in verse
13, that the ashes of a heifer and the sprinkling of the blood
of bulls and goats, it sanctified to the purifying of the flesh.
It let those that were ceremonially unclean socially come back into
mixing with the others in the camp. But, verse 23, but the
heavenly things themselves, they've got to be purified with better
sacrifices than these. So in verse 14, having said that
the blood of animals cleanses for ceremonial cleansing, in
verse 14, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through
the eternal spirit offered himself without spot, how much more shall
that purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living
God? Better sacrifices. than these. In verse 24, Christ we see, our
high priest. It's not the high priest of the
Old Testament Levitical order. It's Christ, our priest after
the order of Melchizedek. It's Christ who is God who is
our priest. Our priest is our God. Our God
is our priest. Christ, what does a priest do?
Mediates. There is one God and one mediator
between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. Christ our mediator
priest, after the order of Melchizedek, is not entered into the holy
places made with hands. He didn't go into the holiest
of all in the temple. He did not, for he was not a
Levitical priest. That was just a figure, just
a picture, a pattern of the truth. But where did he go when he'd
accomplished all things? He went into heaven itself. He
went into the reality that the temple and its holiest of all
just was a figure of, just represented. And now he appears in the presence
of God for us. Our God who is a man, became
a man, our Lord Jesus Christ, appears as a man, a holy man
in the presence of God in heaven for us because he's gone in with
his own precious blood. Nor yet, verse 25, nor yet that
he should offer himself often. The Old Testament priests, the
Levitical priests, had to go in once a year on the Day of
Atonement into the holy place, outside of the holiest of all,
every day, the sacrifices by the ordinary priest, not the
high priest, had to be done every single day. But no, not him,
not Christ. Not that he should offer himself
often, as they did, entering into the holy place every year
with the blood of others. No, no, he didn't do that. That
blueprint was required daily. That blueprint was required weekly. It was required for annual repetitions
on the Day of Atonement. And why was it constantly repeated? Because the fact is that it was
ineffectual. It could never take away sins
for real and for good. The pattern had to keep being
repeated because it was only the once-for-all offering of
Christ that did that. Christ didn't need to offer himself
often because his appearing once was effectual. Now look at verses
26 to 28, just read them with me down to the end of the chapter.
For then, he must often have suffered since the foundation
of the world. You see, if Christ had to repeat
in the way of the oft-repeated sacrifice, he would have had
to do it right from the foundation of the world. But no, now, once
in the end of the world, has he appeared to put away sin by
the sacrifice of himself. Just once, as it is appointed
unto men. Once to die. but after this the
judgment. So Christ was once offered to
bear the sins of many, and unto them that look for him shall
he appear the second time, without sin, unto salvation. That one
appearance only, but yet there is a second appearance coming.
What is a believer's view of cosmology? You know, the view
of cosmology, the view of life that is presented in the media
and in the world is all evolutionary, godless evolutionary. But what
is the believer's view of cosmology? It's this, in a nutshell, that
God created all things. As we read in John 1 at the start,
all things were made by the Lord Jesus Christ, by God the Son,
by the Word. All things were made, but God
created, and then sin entered. And then Christ came once. When
the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son,
made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem those that are
under the law. And now, We wait for his second
coming, when he will return to end all things. So, first point,
once hath he appeared, at the end of verse 26. Now once in
the end of the world, Hath he appeared to put away sin by the
sacrifice of himself? God has appeared to put away
sin by the sacrifice of himself. God was hidden. God has always
been hidden. No man has seen God at any time.
We read in John 1 and verse 18. No man has seen God. God was
hidden, but God could be inferred. God could be inferred in creation. You look around you. Here in
this country we have an absolutely beautiful summer's morning. This
morning in the garden is full of beautiful flowers and just
the whole place looks absolutely... You can infer from that that
intelligent design made all of this. God was hidden but can
be inferred. It says in Romans 1, it leaves
man without excuse for not believing in God, because the evidence
of God creating is everywhere. And in our lives, in our minds,
in our conscience, in our consciousness, we can know that we are created
beings, made in the image of God, communicating beings, able
to talk to one another and and able to speak to God in prayer.
We are conscious beings. And then we have the written
scriptures, which people say, oh, the scriptures are rubbish. I was not long ago told that
I was not welcome. at a discussion group because
I said that, well, I'll come to it, but every time you ask
me a question, my answer will be based on the word of God.
And they said, oh, we want nothing to do with that load of rubbish.
It's just all full of mistakes. Those who truly know the scriptures,
who know God, who grow in grace and knowledge, you know, the
more you know, the more you know, the more you find the fingerprints
of Almighty God on every page of this book. There is no other. That's why it's the Holy Bible.
It's the different book. It's the book which is All other
human literature, all other human wisdom pales into insignificance
compared with this book. We've got the theophanies of
the Old Testament, the appearances of God in Christ in the second
person of the Trinity. The hidden God was actually from
time to time seen in the theophanies when the men that appeared to
Abraham, one of them was the Lord Jesus Christ. The ones who
appeared to Gideon and then to the parents of Samson. and many,
many more, these appearances of God. They were terrified,
because they said, I've seen God, and it says, he who sees
God shall surely die. And they saw him, and they lived.
And then there was that one in Exodus 24, where they went up,
and 70 together with Moses. They saw
God and they ate and drank and they had a good time, it would
seem. And they weren't killed. It must
be that that was the manifestation of Christ before them. God was
manifest in the flesh. That's what it says in 1 Timothy
3.16. 2,024 years ago, The hidden God was fully manifest. God was manifest in the flesh. God was shown in the flesh. He was justified in the spirit. He was seen of angels. He was
preached unto the Gentiles. He was believed on in the world.
He was received up into glory. No man has seen God at any time
but the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father.
He has made him known. He has declared him. He appeared
then to those 70, to the Theophanies, but at Bethlehem, at Bethlehem,
God was manifest. He was announced by angels, the
shepherds, shown to the shepherds, you know, terrified. Unto you is born this day in
the city of David a Saviour which is Christ the Lord. And a multitude
of angels appeared that night in this, in this physical creation,
in this realm of this world, singing praise to God, because
he had become man as a baby. God contracted to a span. The
Word, who was in the beginning with God, who was God, the Word
was made flesh. He grew up in obedience and sinlessness. He was heralded by John the Baptist. He entered on a very public ministry. He was heard by crowds and he
was seen one-to-one as, for example, with the Samaritan woman at the
well. He was ministered to by angels in the temptation and
in the garden. He was feared by devils. Who are you, O you son of David?
He was manifest in the flesh. In him dwelt the fullness of
the Godhead bodily, is what the astounding statement of Colossians
2 verse 9. In that man, Jesus of Nazareth,
dwelt the fullness of the Godhead bodily. So manifest that he said
to his disciples on more than one occasion, he who has seen
me has seen the Father. Show us the Father. He who has
seen me, said Jesus, has seen the Father. I and my Father are
one. The Jews took up stones to stone
him. And the testimony of John, that
they who spent three and a half years in close, intimate contact
with this man, and heard his words, and saw his miracles,
and heard his teaching, he said, we beheld his glory. the glory as of the only begotten
of the Father, full of grace and truth. God was manifest in
the flesh, in the flesh, in this world, in the countryside, by
the sea, in Samaria, in Jerusalem, in the temple when he turned
over the tables of the money changers, by the cheering crowds
when they thronged to see him, when he was brought before Pilate
and Herod. He was manifest in the flesh.
Before the jeering crowds, a few days after they'd laid palm branches
in front of him, and they called for him to be crucified. And
when he was spat upon, and when he was despised and rejected
of men by the Roman soldiers, when he was on the cross, nailed
to the cross, lifted up for all to see, lifted up as he said
himself to Nicodemus in John chapter 3, as Moses lifted up
the serpent in the wilderness. The serpent, which was the picture,
the figure of the very thing that was killing the Israelites
with their bites, the serpent, as Moses lifted up that serpent
and whosoever looked to that serpent was cured of their snake
bite. Jesus said, as Moses lifted up
that serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be
lifted up. Even so must the Son of Man be
lifted. Lifted up on a cross. Why? To die, to shed his blood,
to pay redemption's price. Some were moved. When you look
at the crowd and the reaction, some were evidently moved, some
were quite moved but wouldn't commit because they feared the
authorities, they feared the rest of society, and some were
completely unaffected. You know, like I said last week,
it's that verse in Lamentations. Is it nothing to you, all ye
that pass by? Is it, to some it was nothing.
But why has he appeared? Why has he appeared? Verse 26,
once in the end of the world, he has appeared. Why has he appeared? Answer, to put away sin. he appeared
to put away sin. Most of what calls itself Christian
religion doesn't believe that there's such a thing as sin.
It goes along completely with this fallen world's view of justice
and righteousness. He came to put away sin, which
is a reality, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of
God. The wages of sin is death. The soul that sins, it shall
die. In the day you eat thereof, you
shall surely die. He didn't come to be a good example. and to show God's love and his
goodness, though he did those things as well. No, he came to
put away sin. He came to put away sin as the
scapegoat was pictured, putting away Israel's sin in the picture,
the type. So Christ, who for? For his elect,
he came to put away the sins of his elect. Oh, you say, you're
getting into that. Weird doctrine now, are you? It's the doctrine
of scripture from start to finish. Who is this narrow, narrow group?
It's a multitude that no man can number from every tongue
and tribe and kindred, chosen in Christ before the foundation
of the world and brought to faith and to life in believing in him. And how did he put away sin?
How did he put away sin? At the end of the verse, to put
away sin by the sacrifice of himself. The sacrifice of himself
was to pay the sin debt of his people. Do you realize, you facing
this unavoidable appointment, that you carry with you an overwhelming
sin debt? And come that day of judgment,
because it says it's appointed to man to once die after this,
the judgment, when you stand before the judgment seat of Christ,
All of the books, all of the records will be laid bare. Things
that you cannot even remember will be laid bare. Sin will be
there on display. And there's a debt to be paid.
And how should a man be just with God? Or will we be declared
sinners and justly punished for that sin with eternal condemnation? No, he, by the sacrifice of himself,
paid the sin debt of his people with his lifeblood, and he did
it once, and once only, only once. If you look at chapter
10 and verse 12, but this man, Jesus, after he had offered one
sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on the right hand of God. He sat down. The priest, the
Levitical priest in the Old Testament order, was never able to sit
down because the work was never finished. It was an oft-repeated
patterned picture. But Christ, when he had offered
himself to pay the sin debt of his people, he cried, it is finished. And he sat down, it says, he
sat down. It's a sacrifice that is finished.
It never needs to be repeated. It isn't an annual thing like
the Day of Atonement. It is fully effectual in its
design and its purpose. in one momentous event. One momentous event, he as the
substitute of his people, he as the surety, the guarantor
of his people, he put away the sins of his elect. He died, says
Peter, the just for the unjust that he might bring us to God.
In Isaiah 53 verse 5, as we read earlier, the chastisement of
our peace was upon him. Whose peace? The peace of his
elect, the peace of his people, the peace of those people. Throughout the scriptures, whenever
we read of the we and the us and the our, it's from the perspective
of those who are the redeemed of the Lord, the people of God.
And thereby, doing these things, dying the just for the unjust,
bearing our sins in his own body on the cursed tree, bearing the
chastisement that accomplished our peace himself, thereby, Colossians
1.20, he made peace in the blood of his cross. He made peace between
sinners, his sinful elect multitude, and the God who was offended.
We were enmity with God. We were children of wrath, even
as others. But Christ made peace in the
blood of his cross. He bore the sins of his people
in his own body on that tree. Cursed is everyone that hangeth
on a tree is what the Levitical law said. He blotted out the
handwriting of ordinances that was against us. He blotted it
out, nailing it to his cross, Colossians chapter 2 and verse
14. He is the only one in whom sins
are taken away. As you face this appointment
and then the judgment, do you hope for anywhere else? Do you
hope that any other way is going to make peace for you before
that judgment seat of Christ? There's no other way that you
are made the righteousness of God except in Him. He made Him,
who knew no sin, to be sin for us. So He would bear the penalty
of that sin. Why? That we might be made the
righteousness of God in Him. You are not made right with God
in religion. You're not made right with God
in your good works, your good efforts. You're not made right
with God by your dedication to a cause, or by your character,
or by the tradition that you were raised in, or the culture
that you have come from. Not one of these things avails
anything before the judgment seat of Christ. It's just that
once-for-all sacrifice. Once-for-all time, never to be
repeated, Once for all of his elect, not one of them left out,
and nobody else included. It's the only propitiation. It's the only thing that pronounces
mercy seat. It's the only thing that turns
away the wrath of God from sin. No blasphemous oft-repeated mass,
that doesn't achieve it. That's just a curse. No law works,
no law works. They're just filthy rags righteousness.
No idolatrous views of a soft God. What do I mean by that?
People have a view of God which is an idolatrous view because
the God that they have pictured in their mind is not really serious
about sin. He's not really the God that
must punish sin, the God that must exact, exactly the penalty
that is called for by sin. No, he's a God who is strictly
just. Read the article by Don Faulkner
that I put in the bulletin. Nothing but the blood of Jesus
shed once for all. There was an old hymn that we
used to sing. What can wash away my sins? Nothing but the blood
of Jesus. Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
Verse 27, appointed to men to die once, but after this the
judgment. Why once? Just as all of us, just as you
and me have, now listen, we have one appointment with death. Known to God, we have one appointment
with death and then the judgment. And that is the unchangeable
end of the earthly account for each one of us. Just as each
one of us has that one appointment, so, verse 28, so Christ, in the
same way that we each have one appointment with death, so Christ
was once offered to bear the sins of many. He was once offered
to bear them. Not all people who ever lived,
but of many. The many are his elect. Link
this to Hebrews chapter 2. If you go back to Hebrews chapter
2 and verse 9, talking about, you know, he's already said how
Christ is, Jesus is better than the angels, and then He comes
down how he was made for a little while lower than the angels. Verse seven, you made him the
son of man, made him a little lower or for a little while lower
than the angels and you've crowned him with glory and honor. and
it set him over the works of your hands. You put all things
in subjection under his feet. For in that he put all in subjection
under him, he left nothing that is not put under him. But now
we see not yet all things put under him, but we see Jesus,
who was made a little lower than the angels, made for a little
while lower than the angels. Why did he come down and be lower
than the angels? For the suffering of death. He
came for the suffering of death. God, in his inherent nature of
spirit, cannot die. God cannot pay the penalty for
the sins of his people. He must become man. made lower
than the angels for the suffering of death. And now we see him
crowned with glory and honor. Now this is it, that he, by the
grace of God, should taste death for every man. Now we know every
man doesn't mean everyone that ever lived, because in the next
verse he talks about many sons. But look, this is what it means.
He came once, he was once offered to bear the sins of many. Not
all, not all. that he should taste death for
every man, for every one of his elect. Or, might taste of every
death is a way it could be translated. Or, to put it another way, that
he might die the one death due for sin to every one of the elect. That he might die, say it again,
because it's complicated language, that he might die the one death
due for sin to every one of the elect. Every one of his elect
were all sinners, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of
God, and thereby the justice of God demands one death. But
that verse Hebrews 2 verse 9 says that he should taste of every
death. He should die the death due to
the sin for every one of his elect. My sin violates divine
justice, which demands death. But in eternal union with Christ,
Galatians chapter two and verse 20 says this. Let me say it again. My sin demands death under the
justice of God. But look, verse 20 of Galatians
two. I am crucified with Christ, says
Paul. I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless
I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life which
I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God
who loved me and gave himself for me. But this is the point
where the law demands my death in union with Christ. When was
I placed in that union with Christ? If I'm amongst the people of
God, I was placed in union with him from before the beginning
of time, before the world was made. And when he died on the
cross of Calvary, I died there. The law and justice of God was
satisfied concerning me and my sin because I died in Christ
when he died. It's the same as Romans chapter
seven says in verse four. Wherefore, my brethren, ye also
are become dead to the law by the body of Christ. When he died,
you died that we should be married to another. When he died, you
died. Has God's Spirit shown you, and
how does he show you? He shows you by faith, he gives
you the faith to believe it. Has he shown you that you are
eternally united with Christ? That before the beginning of
time, God joined you to Christ, so that So that when Christ died
to satisfy offended justice, you died in Him. And hence, the
result? You stand before that judgment
seat of Christ with no sin to be judged. Why? Because God cannot
be unjust. He's already punished it. He's
already paid for it in the Lord Jesus Christ. If you've not seen
this, however good a person people may think you to be, however
kind people may think you to be, or sociable, or cultured,
or respected, let me put it bluntly, as bluntly as the word of God
puts it, you are eternally lost under just condemnation. But,
and we'll quickly finish with this, verse 28, Christ was once
offered to bear the sins of many, and unto them that look for him
he shall appear the second time without sin unto salvation. He shall appear, he's appeared
once and accomplished salvation, but he shall appear the second
time. In Revelation 1 verse 7, We read
this, behold, he cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see
him, and they also which pierced him. All kindreds of the earth
shall wail because of him. Even so, amen. The first time
he came in all the sufferings of human flesh, we read a few
weeks ago in Hebrews 5 and verse 7 about his strong crying and
tears. He was, as Isaiah 53 says, a
man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. He had nowhere to
lay his head. He'd had none of the comforts
and luxuries of this life. He knew what it was to be hungry,
as a man, as a real man. He knew what it was to be wearied
with his journey, to be tired. He wept at the grave of Lazarus. He experienced joy in the company
of Lazarus and Mary and Martha and the company around them.
He came in all the weakness and the lowliness of his humble human
existence, strong crying and tears. But the second time he
comes, when he comes at the end of time, to bring an end to this
creation, when he comes the second time, when it says he will be
without sin, it doesn't mean that he came with sin the first
time. No, it means that he will not need to be loaded with sin.
He will not need to be made sin for his people. He will not need
to bear the sins of his people on the tree because he did it
once in the middle of time. It has all been put away. So
without bearing sin in him, and without sin in his church, because
that sin has been taken away. Because as Ephesians 5, 27 says,
it is a glorious church without spot or wrinkle. The church of
God is a glorious church. People tell us that we need to
fear standing before the judgment seat of Christ. If you're in
Christ and believe in Christ, look forward to it with rejoicing. We don't need to fear that. It's
a glorious thing. Come ye blessed of my Father,
inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of
the world. It says, every eye shall see
him, in that verse in Revelation. Every eye shall see him and be
broken and shall wail because of him, except those, verse 28,
those that look for him. And to them that look for him
shall he appear the second time. To them he shall appear unto
salvation the last two words of the verse to them he shall
appear unto salvation there is an appointment with death but
for the believer in christ who has accomplished redemption for
us that appearance is unto salvation we're already saved in him but
this is the kind of the consummation of the reality of it Their vile
bodies, it says in Philippians 3.21, these vile bodies, because
we're still cursed with sin, shall be transformed into the
likeness of his glorious body. Verse 21 of Philippians 3, who
shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto
his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is
able even to subdue all things unto himself. We are, as 1 Corinthians
15 says, we are sown in corruption, the corruption of sin, but raised
on that day in incorruption. Are you looking for him? Are
you a believer looking for him or trying to put it off? Are
we, as Paul writes to Titus, chapter 2, verse 13 of Titus,
looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory, the
glorious appearing, the appearing of the glory of the great God
and our Savior, Jesus Christ, are we, as Don Faulkner used
to say, standing on the tiptoe of faith, looking for him to
come again, prepared for the unavoidable appointment. This
is it. The appointment is unavoidable,
but you either face it prepared or unprepared. Are you prepared
for it? Is your trust in the Lord Jesus
Christ? Are you resting in him? Do you
hope with confidence or do you hope with fingers crossed and
other superstitious things that people do? or do you rightly
fear death and judgment? Because to be outside of Christ,
it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living
God who is a consuming fire. Who will you believe, God and
his word or sinful man and his idols of religion and worldly
culture?