Hebrews 9. That's a lot I want
to cover. So we're just going to go down
through these verses and make brief comments. Let's read verses
1-12. Hebrews 9. Speaking of the law, the first
covenant had ordinances or ceremonies of divine service toward God
in a worldly or a physical sanctuary. There was a tabernacle made.
The first where Ian was, he's talking about the actual temple. I wish I had that model up here,
but we don't. But there was a tabernacle made,
and into the first part of that tabernacle that was the candlestick
and the table, the showbread, which is called the sanctuary,
the holy place. And after that, after the second
veil, the tabernacle or the room which is called the holiest of
all, the holy of holies, which had the golden censer, incense,
and the ark of the covenant overlaid round about with gold wherein
was the golden, inside this ark was the manna. pot of manna,
Aaron's rod that budded, the tables of the governor, that
is the Ten Commandments of Law, and over that ark was the cherubims
of glory shadowing the mercy seat of which They cannot now
speak particularly. And now when these things were
thus ordained, the priests, common priests, went always into the
first room, the first tabernacle, accomplishing the service of
God. But into the second, holy of
holies, went the high priest alone, once every year, and not
without blood, which he offered for himself and for the errors
of the people. The Holy Ghost, this signifying,
showing us that the way into the holiest of all, heaven itself,
was not yet made manifest or clear. while as the first tabernacle
was yet standing, which was, this first one was a figure,
a symbol for the time then present in which were offered both gifts
and sacrifices that could not make him that did the service
perfect as pertaining to the conscience. These things stood
only in meats and drinks and different washings and carnal
ordinances or ceremonies imposed on them until the time of Reformation,
but Christ being come and high priest. We've been looking at
that, the great high priest after the order of Melchizedek. Christ being come, a high priest
of good things to come by a greater and more perfect tabernacle,
not made with hands, that is to say, not a building, and neither
by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered
in once into the holy place, heaven itself, having obtained
eternal redemption for us. Alright? Go back to verse 1. It says, now, there was a worldly
sanctuary, a physical building. First it was a tent until the
people of God got to Israel. And then there was a temple that
was built by Solomon. Okay? A worldly sanctuary. Alright? But now, down in verse
24, It says, Christ is not entered into a holy place made with hands,
but into heaven itself. And he goes on to give the things
that were found in the temple, verse 2, and all of these As
most of you know, are symbols, types, shadows of Christ himself. So there was a tabernacle, verse
2, the first room wherein was the candlestick. That was the
light. The only light in that temple
was that candlestick. It had seven candles, remember. Seven, the number of perfection.
That's Christ. Christ is the light. Scripture
said, He said, I am the light of the world. Christ is the light. Perfect light. And His light
Only in His light do we see light. What light? The light of the
knowledge. We quote that a lot, don't we?
It always comes up. If you have any light on any
subject, it's through Christ. The light of the knowledge of
the glory of God in the person of Christ. He's the candlestick.
Well, He's much more than that, though. He's the sun. That first
candlestick gave a little bit of light. as much light as it
could give. Christ is called the Son of Righteousness. Then there was a table and a
showbread, verse 2. The table and the showbread. On the other side of the room
was the showbread. What does that represent? And
every day was fresh bread. The common priests went into
this room and they would bring fresh bread every morning. Daily
bread. And I'm a common priest. Not like these fellows in robes
that take your confession. You know that. You're a priest.
ministering about the things of God. But it's my job to bring
bread, to preach Christ the bread of life daily, every time. Serve the bread. Like I said,
I'm a short order cook. Daily bread. Christ is that bread
of life. He said that, didn't he? I am
the bread from heaven. And now that's called the sanctuary. That was in the first room. You
walk in the first room. And there was a candlestick and
a table of showbread. Alright? And then there was a
veil. Great, tall, vast, heavy, thick
veil without seam. woven through and through. And
that veil separated this room, the holy place, from the holiest
of holies. Alright? And verse 3 says, after
the second veil, it's called the holiest of all. This represents heaven itself. Alright? There's a veil that
separates us and heaven itself. I mean, a veil, this veil of
this life. But beyond that is heaven itself. We dwell in the temple of God.
We minister about the temple of God, which is the church.
The church. This is the outer core. But you
know, the veil, when Christ was on the cross, rent in two. We can see with the eye of faith
into heaven itself. That's what Stephen said when
he was being stoned. He said, I see the Son of Man
standing at the right hand of the Majesty on high. I see. Right
there he is, the high priest standing in the holy of holies
right now. I see the ark, Stephen said. I see the mercy seat. I
see the blood on the mercy seat. I see the high priest standing
there, ever living to make intercession. I see. But back then, there was
still this great big veil separating the outer court from the inner
holiest of holy. And in that holy of holies, verse
4, was the golden censer. The incense. Somebody took that
in there. The high priest. He had that. And it was put on it. Sweet smelling
incense. Spices of all sorts. Which represent
the prayers of the Lord Jesus Christ. Prayers of the Lord Jesus
Christ. His intercession. And the high
priest would take that incense into the Holy of Holies. Beneath
the veil in the Holy of Holies. That is in there. Read on. Then in verse 4 it says, And
inside was this golden ark, covered with gold, this ark of the covenant,
this vessel of mercy, this box wherein contained three things. It had the manna, the bread,
part of that miraculous manna. What is it? Manna. What is it?
That miraculous manna that came down from God to sustain the
life of His people, Aaron's rod, that rod which the Lord used
to do so many things, part the Red Sea and so forth, the rod
that budded, fruitful, ever-living rod, and then there was the tables
of the covenant, the law. What is all that? You know what
that is. That's all speaking of Christ. He's the ark. The ark of the
covenant, the gold represents his purity and his majesty and
his royalty, golden. And Christ is the bread, Christ
is fruit under our God, Christ is that rod by which the Lord
rules and judges and so forth, and he is the keeper of the law.
And then it says in verse 5, over that were the cherubims
of glory. The Lord told Solomon, through
David his father, to erect, to carve these cherubims, or angels,
which stood over the ark at all times And their wings touched
each other, two angels over top of that ark. And their wings
touched each other and always over top of that ark of the covenant. What is that? Well, Peter wrote
in 1 Peter 1, verse 12, speaking of the things of Christ, he said,
which things the angels desire to look into. The angels. In Isaiah 6, holy, holy, holy,
the angels say, is the Lord God of hope. The angels in marvel
and wonder and praise Glory. Look upon the Lord Jesus Christ
in all His person and work. And then it says, verse 5, there
was a mercy seat. He said, of which things we cannot
now speak particularly. And if I stopped to dwell on
this, that's as far as we would get. But that would be all right. The mercy seat. That covering
over top of the The ark was where the blood was poured. Every time
the high priest went into that holy of holy within the veil,
he always went, never went without blood. And he went and he poured
that blood on the mercy seat. And that mercy seat, well, that's
Christ. Christ is the mercy. All right,
now, verse 6 says, now when these things were thus
ordained, the priests went always into the first tabernacle, accomplishing
the service of God. Common priests. Sons of Aaron. Okay? Levites. And the sons of Aaron, they did
this. But now, verse 7, into the second
and to the Holy of Holies went the high priest alone, one man."
Read on, it says, "...once every year, not without blood, which
he offered for himself as a man." No woman, but a man. This man. Into that second, or holiest
of holies, went the high priest alone, by himself, once every
year. And he didn't dare go in there
without blood, or God would have killed him. Never go in there
without blood. He offered it for himself and
for the people. Verse 8 says, The Holy Spirit,
the Holy Ghost signifies that the way into the holiest of all
was not made clear yet, as long as that first temple was still
standing, the tabernacle was still standing. The Holy Ghost
tells us then that the way was not yet made clear, because they
kept doing that. Do you remember Brother Dan Bart's
message here on the only high priest who sat down? And he,
in his meticulous, careful way, he added up, actually added up
all of the sacrifices, all the priests and all the sacrifices
over the years until Christ came. And it was an astronomical number
of sacrifices, millions of sacrifices, rivers of animal blood that were
shed year after year after year. And there were daily sacrifices
too. And everybody that came had any kind of issues, sin issues,
they had to come and then bring a sacrifice, blood. So there
were rivers of blood and millions upon millions of animals killed,
and not needlessly, mind you, the people ate that food. God's
not a monster. That was good. And then the high
priest went in there every year to make that great atonement,
the Passover. High priest alone. One man went
in there every year. Every year he kept doing it.
Every year. Every year. The Holy Ghost showing us that
it's not finished. It's not finished. Okay? Showing
us that this is not putting away any sin. He wouldn't keep doing
it if it put it away. Right? I'm getting a little ahead of
myself, but you know what the Mass is? The Mass, they practice
it every... I think the Episcopal religion
practices the Eucharist. which is another form of the
mass, and what that is, and they make no bones about it, they
say this is the actual blood of Christ. That the priest, when
he blesses it, it actually turns into the blood of Christ. There's
a big word for that called transubstantiation. Alright? People went to the stake
and were burned at the stake, renouncing that. The early martyrs
and early preachers of the gospel were burned at the stake by Catholicism
and pagan religion because they renounced that. They said, no,
that's not the body of Christ. That's not the blood of Christ.
It was sin once. They went to the stake and they
were literally killed for telling the truth. No, we don't offer
His body over and over and over again. No man has in his power
to forgive you your sins or to go to God for you and offer up
anything for the forgiveness of your sin. There's one man
that did that. Jesus Christ. And when he did
that, and that's what this whole book is saying. I mean the whole
book. I mean Genesis to Revelation.
But the Hebrews especially goes into great detail to show us
there's one man who went into the heaven itself for God's people
with one sacrifice that alone could put away sin. And that's
Jesus Christ. And he did it. He did it. And I've gotten way ahead of
myself. But that's all right. A bomb might drop. One man. And men died, and women
died refuting that stuff. And it's still going on today.
The Mass. A lot of people are ignorant
of what the Mass is, but that's what it is. They say it actually
turns into the blood and the body of Jesus Christ, and that
the priest administers it to you. No, no, no. Even in the
table that we observe, the Lord's table, I don't give that to you.
I don't take the cup and put it to your lips. I don't break
the bread and put it in your mouth like those priests do. I don't do that. The Lord said
to His disciples, you take it and you eat it. Drink this. It's by faith that we take it. I don't administer anything.
Right? I tell you who does. The Lord.
The Holy Spirit himself is the one that gives it. All right,
where are we? Hebrews, chapter 9. Verse 9 and
10 says, all this was a figure or symbol, shadows, shadows,
types. Shadows and types of verse 9. Offer gifts and sacrifices that
could not make him that did the service perfect if pertained
to the conscience. Conscience. You know, those priests
were very, very fearful that they did everything perfectly.
You know, in a sense, there's a great sense in which we want
to do what we do here in the fear of the Lord as it should
be according to the Scripture. But there was great fear because
God would strike a man dead back then if it wasn't perfect. But these things only stood in
meets and drinks and washings and carnal ceremonies that were
imposed on them that God told them to do until the Reformation. That is, until Christ came and
took away the first to establish the second. Alright? Now here it is. Here's the good
news. Here's the gospel. But Christ,
verse 11, Christ being come, and high priest of good things
to come. Scripture says of Christ, Lo,
I come. In the volume of the book it
is written of me. Every bit of these things, as
we've already seen, represent the Lord Jesus Christ. In the
volume of the book, every line, line upon line, precept upon
precept, points to the Lord Jesus Christ who was to come and fulfill
all this, and offer one sacrifice forever, and put away sin forever by the
sacrifice of Himself. And thus fulfill all this, proving
who He is and putting away the sins of His people. Verse 11,
Christ came, a high priest of good things, to come by a greater
and more perfect tabernacle. That's himself. That's himself. A body. Christ said, a body hast
thou prepared me. The temple in which God Almighty,
God was manifest in the flesh. Like this temple, Christ is the
bread, is the light, is the prayers, he's the ark, he's the covenant,
he's the rod, he's the manna, he's all things. And he came
with a body, a man, a greater and more perfect tabernacle.
That first tent that Moses and they carried through the wilderness,
that's just a temporary thing, wasn't it? When they got to finally
the promised land, Joshua and then Solomon, as we said, built
the temple, all right? Now we've got a permanent temple.
No sir. It was torn down twice. Remember,
Ezra, Nehemiah, Zerubbabel. Zerubbabel went and rebuilt it,
which is a picture of Christ also. But that first temple was
torn down and they built another one, Zerubbabel. And then our
Lord came. Remember the Lord, the messenger
of the covenant? Christ shall suddenly come to
His temple. Well, He came to that earthly
temple. Remember? Remember we just studied that.
He came to that earthly temple that Zerubbabel rebuilt. And walked in there, and then
walked out, cleaned it out, and walked back out. And his disciples
said, isn't this a beautiful temple? And the Lord said, not
one stone is going to be enough to stand on it. Don't marvel at that temple.
Marvel at me. I'm the rock of ages. I'm the
top stone. I'm the foundation, and I'm the
top stone which is irrevocable. Christ Himself cries grace. Grace
unto it. And that Holy of Holies, Christ
Himself tabernacled among us, and then went back to the Holy
of Holies, and He sat down. We still have a temple, a tabernacle,
not made with hands. But that is to say, in the heavens
itself. The heavens itself. Look at it.
That's verse 24. Look down there. Verse 24. It
says, Christ is not entered into the holy place made with hands,
which are figures of the true, but in the heaven itself. now
to appear in the presence of God for us. All right. Now, verse 11. It says, Not a
building laid with hands. And verse 12 says, Neither did
he go in to the Holy of Holies by the blood of calves and goats. But it's not possible that the
blood of calves and goats put away sin. But it says, He entered
into heaven itself. The holy place. And what he did
was he offered up his own precious blood. His own precious blood. That's what Peter called it.
His own precious blood. His own blood. Verse 12. His
own blood he entered in and it says he obtained eternal redemption. Eternal redemption for us. Who's the us? We've already been
looking at that, haven't we? The whole letter, the whole book
is written to the holy brethren, partakers of the head and the
collar. The people of God. Israel. Spiritual Israel. He
did that with his own precious blood. It says that he obtained
eternal redemption. It doesn't say he put down a
down payment. No. It doesn't say he did all
he could do and now it's up to you. Obtained is obtained. Finished is finished. Accomplished
is accomplished. He obtained. The price was paid. Redemption was accomplished.
Sins were put away. We sing that song, full atonement. Can it be? Oh yeah. It not only can be, it is. Hallelujah. What a Savior. for
the people of God. Verse 13 and 14. We'll quit here. It says, now, if the blood of
bulls and of goats and ashes of a heifer are sprinkled into
unclean, sanctify it to the purifying of the flesh. And it did something. It helped somewhat back then. The lepers were actually claimed,
but sins weren't put away. But verse 14. How much more shall
the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself
without spot to God, without fault to God, blameless, how
much more shall the blood of Christ purge your conscience
from dead works to serve the living God? And that's what I
was just referring to. Men and women go through countless
rituals and ceremonies and masses and cleansings and fastings at
the Lord's table. Lent, you know, it's this time
of year of Lent, whatever that is, where you give up something.
That's what it is, isn't it? You give up something. And Ash Wednesday. I ran into
a woman one time. She had a smudge on her head.
I said, you've got dirt on your head. She said, no, it's ashes.
I started to wipe. She said, no, don't do that. I wiped my ashes
off. I said, what? Ashes? She said, ash Wednesday. She
couldn't believe I didn't know what ash Wednesday was. She doesn't know who Christ is.
And I told her that. I sat down with a scripture and
showed her. Show me where it says that you
put ashes on your head. where you do this or where you
do anything. I'll show you where Christ, and I did show you where
Christ finished it, did it all. Where you look to Him and Him
alone. People going through all that.
Dead works. Dead works. Any works done to
thank and appease in God and please in God and God is looking
at this and well pleased and He's marking down and we're scoring
points and He's going to let us into heaven if we get enough
merit badges. establish our righteousness.
That's what Paul wrote of, didn't it? Going about doing things
to please God. There's one man who pleased God. The Lord is well pleased, Isaiah
42 says, for His righteousness' sake. For Christ's righteousness'
sake. God accepted everything Jesus
Christ did, accepted it on behalf of His people. We're accepted
in the Beloved. His works were our works. You see? It's not by works of
righteousness, which we did, but His works of righteousness
that God accepted. You know that, but everybody
doesn't know that. And how blessed you are if you
do. Everything else is dead works. Ceremonial things. Even the law.
Try to keep the Ten Commandments. I love the law of God. I don't
want to have another God before me. Do you? I don't want to take
His name in vain. Do you steal all of these things? Do you? I want to remember Christ
and the Sabbath. I do, don't you? That's the law
of God. But I've broken all those things.
And you have too. In thought, in word, and in deed
even. But Christ didn't. Christ didn't
break one of them. He's without fault. That's what
that law in that box represents. It was covered up, sealed. You
can't get to it. It's kept. For all eternity,
it's kept. That's right. The keeper of the
law. The blood covering the law that
we broke. But you see, the law even is
dead works. Try to keep the law. Paul said
this, and I quit. He said, the commandment which
was ordained to life, he said, I found to be unto death. It
slew me. Now you tell me if when you hear
the commandment, if it doesn't kill you. Huh? It just kills me. Oh, I'm dead. Does it? Thou shalt not covet. Thou shalt not covet. That's
idolatry. God said covetousness is idolatry. Wanting something you don't have.
Who is not guilty of that? Who is not guilty of idolatry?
of making a God of paying more attention to things than God.
Who is not guilty of that? Kill me. Just show me. There's
only one thing that will sab your conscience, that will purge
your conscience. There's only one thing that will
cover a guilty conscience. One thing. There's only one thing
that would cover that mercy seat. Only one thing that would cover,
atone, cover The sins of God's people? None. One thing. I'm guilty. I, with
the blood of God's Son, Jesus Christ, God's Son, cleansed them. He said there in chapter 8, in
the end of that chapter, he said, their sins and their iniquities
I will remember no more. Now how can God not remember
something? Only if it's gone. It says, the iniquity of Israel
shall be sought, and it won't be found. Why? It's covered. It's covered. The all-seeing eye of God is
one thing you can't see through it. Then why do we keep preaching
blood? Why do we keep preaching Christ? Because this is a message
for sinners, boy. Guilty sinners. I'm never going
to quit saying that. And we're going to be praising
Him throughout eternity for washing us in His own precious blood.