priesthood, our Lord Jesus Christ,
the priest, what he had to do was he had to offer an atonement.
He had to offer a sacrifice. That was the office of the priesthood.
And so I want to talk about the sacrifice that he offered, the
atonement that he made. You know, in the Old Testament,
and Leviticus, you can see it so many times, but when they
laid their hands on the head of those sacrifices, what they
were doing, and they were transferring their sins to the head of that
bullock or that goat, signifying that they deserved death, and
their sins were going to be laid upon the head of that one, the
one who had no guilt, and he would die in their place. And
so that's what we want to talk about tonight, is the Lord Jesus
Christ, the sacrifice that He offered. All priests offer a
sacrifice, and there are so many theories about our Lord Jesus
and the sacrifice that He offered, about His death on the cross.
There are some that say He was just a martyr. There are some
who say that the only reason He went to the cross is for God
to prove His love to us, and we're so hard-hearted. That we
thought that God thought, well, if He'd nail His Son to a tree
and give His own Son, then maybe if we saw how much God loved
us, He'd move our whole heart, all hard hearts, to turn around
and love Him in return. But that's God saving us and
doing something for us in spite of the cross. And that won't
work. And He died more as just an example. He was more than just a martyr.
And we cannot bypass, every priest has to have something to offer.
And so I want to talk about the offering that our priest made
and what that offering accomplished. But the priest had two functions. First, to offer sacrifices. Ain't
that what I just read to you there in Hebrews 9? He says,
you know, the priest daily often went into the holy place and
thus done the service of God every day. But only our priest
went in once a year. To offer sacrifice for his own
sins, and then for the sins of the people. So that's the first
thing that a priest's function was, to offer sacrifices. And
secondly, is to make intercession. To make intercession. To make
atonement. And you know, you remember on
the day of atonement, the priest did everything. The priest did
everything. And that atonement was made on
the day of atonement, and it was called a holy day. Sins were
put away. And the people rejoiced, and
the priests under the law had offered sacrifices, but their
sacrifices could never put away sins. But the Lord Jesus Christ,
His sacrifice, now we're not talking about the atonement He
made, the sacrifice He made. The Lord Jesus' sacrifice did
put away sin. And the reason being, and I don't
care what else you say, The thing that has to be satisfied is the
justice of God. People say Satan held us and
Christ paid a ransom to Satan for Satan to let us go. There's
nothing to that. That's a lie hashed in hell.
The devil didn't hold us in bondage. Justice of God held us in bondage. God is a just God and a holy
God and a righteous God and will by no means clear the guilty.
He will not sweep sin under the rug. And that justice must be
satisfied. And I say that the sacrifice
that Christ offered, and all for whom He offered Himself for,
must be free from sin, because the justice of God is satisfied
in such a way, and He put away sin in such a way, that God Himself,
justice, says, let them go free. Let them go free. Now, Lord Jesus,
He had He had an active obedience, and he had a passive obedience,
as he came here to be the Lamb of God, to be the sacrifice for
his people. And his active obedience was
his whole life, and his active obedience was when he rendered
obedience to the law, obedience to his Father, obedience in every
single way as a man. Perfect and perpetual obedience
from the day he was born until the day that he died on that
cross. And then his passing obedience
is when he willingly, voluntarily had our sins and our guilt laid
upon him and charged to him, and he submitted himself to the
justice of God, the wrath of God, to die in our room and place. And I want to look at the success
of our Lord's sacrifice. the success of his sacrifice.
It says here in verse 26, For then must he have offered suffer
since the foundation of the world, if he had to be offered over
and over again. But now, once in the end of the world, hath
he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. Now,
this is the atonement that he made. This is what he offered.
Now, once, once, he was promised, he was prophesied to come. He
said that he would be the Lamb of God, said that he would be
the messenger of the covenant, would come suddenly to the temple.
He was promised, he was prophesied, and he came and he is appearing.
He appeared at his birth in Bethlehem. He appeared in the temple when
Simeon saw him when he was eight days old and picked him up when
his mother had come and made an offering for him and offered
him as he was eight days old to the Lord as the firstborn.
And Simeon saw him and took him up in his arms and says, Now
let thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation. He hadn't suffered yet. He hadn't
died yet. He hadn't bled yet. But he said,
Still, mine eyes see thy salvation. And then, beloved, he had his
appearing in his public ministry. The day that our Lord Jesus Christ
stood up in Nazareth, and he took the book, and he began to
read out of the book, and he says, Now, this day, this scripture
is fulfilled in your ear. He appeared. And he appeared
once. And now, beloved, he come into
this world to appear, and now once. Once. Once. Where did he appear at?
In the end of the world. You know, Everybody's talking
about the end of the world, and all these birds that just dropped
out of the sky, and all them fish that just died down in Arkansas.
They say, boy, they're biblical plagues, like biblical plagues.
Let me tell you something. The end of the world, the end
of days, started when Christ came into this world. That was
called the last days when Christ came into this world. That's
called the end of days, the end of the world. And what did He
mean by the end of the world, the last days? That meant, beloved,
that this is the end of the world of sin, the end of the world
of death, the end of the world of hell, the end of the world
of judgment, the end of the world of wrath for all whom Christ
offered Himself for. And He is the end. He is the
fulfillment of the purposes of all that God is going to do in
this world. There's nothing else. that God's ever going to do in
this world. It begins with Christ and ends with Christ. And He
appeared once in the end of the world. We're at the end of the
world, aren't we? In fact, our Lord Jesus Christ, He says, My
time has not yet come, but your time is always. Always. And then look what it says. But
now once in the end of the world hath He appeared. Oh my. To put away sin. To put away sin. Put away sin. You know it says here in verse
24, For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with
hands. Those are just figures of the truth. So evidently there
was a holy place in glory. What was just typical down here,
there was something in heaven just like it. But He appeared
in the heaven itself now to appear in the presence of God for us.
And so He entered in there to put away sin. And sin was never,
ever put away under the law. Never put away. In fact, all
the law did was put men in remembrance of their sins. Look over there
in verse 3 of chapter 10. Every year when they'd offer
those sacrifices on the Day of Atonement, in those sacrifices
there is a remembrance again made of sins every year. Evidently,
you know, so they came and offered them again year after year after
year. They said, your sins are not put away. All the sin that's
committed this year, every time they've done it, it says, our
sin is not put away. We're here to make another sacrifice. And
that's what Armenians mean. That's what free-wheelers mean.
They've got to just keep coming. And they sin and they come to
it all and put them away. They sin and they come to it
all and put them away. They sin and come to it all and put them
away. And all the sin was never put away under the law. The sacrifice
and offerings under the law, all they've done was just remind
a man of his sins. And sin is a hard thing to put
away. It's a hard thing to put away.
Don't you wish you could put it away? Don't you wish you could
put away the things that hit your mind? Don't you wish you
could put away the fears, the anxieties, the unbelief that
you had? Don't you wish, don't you would to God that you could
have a perfect mind and a perfect heart? That you'd never doubt
God, never question God? That you'll never have an angry
moment or an anxious moment? That you'll never fret or fear
or worry or doubt? And all of that is sin. Every
bit of it is sin. You know, we don't have to start
accusing people of things that they do with their hands. We've
done enough sinning without anybody looking at us, without anybody
seeing what's going on in our mind and in our heart, to damn
the whole human race just with what's in us and nobody sees
but us and God Almighty. Sin's a hard thing to put away.
The blood of animals didn't do it. It's not possible that the
blood of bulls and goats should put away sin. Then obedience
to the law doesn't do it. Oh no, by the deeds of the law
shall no flesh be justified in the sight of God. I mean, a man
can do everything he possibly could do, but all he got to do
is just fail in one point of the law, and he nullifies everything
he's ever done. nullifies everything he's ever
done. Works can't do it. There's not a work a human being
can do that will put away sin. Morality can't do it. Good intentions
can't do it. And when I first come down here,
and of course, people say, you know, they say, well, He suffered. Somebody gets sick and they've
laid to suffer for a long, long time. They say what they're doing
is this. God is punishing him for his sins. And when he gets
through burning the hell out of him and making him suffer
for his sins, then he'll take him to heaven with him. He suffered
so he could sin. God's making him pay for his
sins. That is, that's a horrible thing to say. Could anybody ever by any amount
of suffering ever put away one's sin? That's what those priests
and that's what those monks and everything that they thought
they'd do. They'd go in there and punish themselves and cause themselves
to suffer and bleed and beat their brains out and blood come
off their head and everything else, trying to make themselves
suffer to make atonement for their own sins. But beloved,
suffering, no matter the suffering that a man does, cannot put away
a sin and not make God look on a man with pity even. But blessed be the Lord Jesus,
there was a sacrifice to put away sin. Oh, it's hard to put
away, but listen, God knows how to put it away. And He says He
appeared once in the end of the world to put away sin, listen
to it, by the sacrifice of Himself. And oh my, He appeared to put
away sin once! Once! by the sacrifice of himself.
One life, one offering. Look over at Hebrews 7.27 with
me just a moment. One life, one offering. He put
away sin once. Put away sin once by the sacrifice
which he offered. It says here in Hebrews 7.27. He says, Who did it but daily
as those high priests offer up sacrifice, first for his own
sins, then for the people's? For this he did once when he
offered up himself. You see, beloved, he put away
sin once. Once. Those sacrifices never
put away sin. It just made a remembrance of
them. But he done it by the sacrifice of himself. And I'd like to understand
what it means when he says himself. I've always thought about that,
and I've probably expressed it time and time again here, what
it means when He, by the sacrifice of Himself. What is it that makes
us ourselves? What is it that when we give
ourselves, what does it mean when self is offered? Everything that makes Him, Him.
What does it mean when He, by the sacrifice of Himself? What
part of him was the sacrifice? What part of him was held back?
What part of him was the sacrifice? What part of him put away sin
once and for all? Well, whatever made him him and
made him himself, that's what he gave. That's what he gave. And, O beloved, he by the sacrifice
of himself, he after he himself purged our sins. Though he tread
the winepress alone, He drank the cup of God's wrath alone. He was, when they come into the
garden to get sin to get it, He was taken alone. He was the
only and the last sacrifice that ever put away sin. The only sacrifice
that ever put away sin was put away once and for all by the
Lord Jesus Christ as His sacrifice and Himself was that sacrifice
that made an atonement that satisfied God forever. And oh, look over
here in 1 Peter 3.18 with me just a moment. Keep Hebrews 9.
Look at 1 Peter 3.18. 1 Peter 3.18. I'm talking about
once. Once. He put away sin once. Oh my. You know how many preachers
are going to get up tonight doing it, and they're doing it in meetings
all over the world, and they'll do it on Sunday night and say,
anybody here got any sin they need to repent of? Anybody got
any sin that they won't come up here and confess? I don't, because I ain't got
any. Why don't I? He put away once
for all. I can't confess to something
I'm not guilty of and I'm not going to. That's one of the mysteries
of the gospel. In ourselves, we know we're nothing
to sin, but in Christ, we know that we have no sin at all. that
He put it away once and for all by the sacrifice of Himself.
And that's why we've got to keep hearing Him and looking to Him
and finding such comfort and assurance in Him, because we
dare not look to ourselves. I've looked at myself for so
long that I'm just about to despair until God let me one day hear
the gospel. And look here in 1 Peter 3.18
again and talk about once. for Christ also hath once suffered
for sin, just once. He was the just for the unjust. And listen to this, that he might
try to bring us to God, that he'll open a door to get us possibly
in the presence of God. No, no, that he might bring us
bring us. He brings many sons to glory.
And I'm telling you, when it says that He might bring us to
God, and that's exactly what He did. He brings us to God.
And being put to death in the flesh, but quickened in the Spirit. So you see, He suffered once. Once. And so back over here in
Hebrews with me. He entered once. Look there in
verse 12. This is how glorious his sacrifice
was. How glorious, how blessed, how
perfect an atonement he made for us. He says, neither by the
blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in
once. Once. Just once. He put away sin once. He entered once. He suffered
once. Now watch this. And where did
he enter into? He entered into the holy place. He entered into behind the veil.
He entered in, beloved, where God was. He entered into the
presence of God Himself. And, beloved, I mean, he didn't
do like that priest that went behind the veil. And there, beloved,
He offered that blood, and He put it on the mercy seat, and
He let that, and He kept that censer going, and when He got
in there, no, no, He went behind there, nobody could see Him.
And our Lord Jesus Christ, He entered in once into the holy
place, and He went into the very presence of God Himself. That
transaction that was made on the cross, that transaction where
Christ entered in once with His own blood, and He entered in
once into that holy place. Just once. And that place that's
made without hands. God is here. He dwells apart
from man. The way wasn't made manifest,
the Scriptures tell us. And He entered into that holy
place. And what did He enter in with? With His own blood?
With His own blood? You know, they would offer that
sacrifice. They'd put it in a bowl. They'd put it in a bowl. And
so when that priest entered behind that veil with that bowl of blood,
my Lord Jesus Christ never entered
into glory with a bowl of blood. No, no. When that high priest
went behind that veil and sprinkled that blood, our Lord Jesus, the
only place blood needs to be sprinkled is on us. But I tell
you, when he entered into that holy place, there was an altar
up there. And you can find that altar in
Revelations. And he went into there, into
that holy place, and there he took his own blood. And what
I mean by his own blood, I think he presented himself I don't
think He went with a bowl of blood. I don't think He poured
it on an altar. I think He took Himself up there. And as the Lamb of God from all
the foundations of the world, He put Himself in the presence
of God. And there was that bloody man
standing in God's presence. And God said, I'm satisfied sin's
put away now. Oh, listen, I'll tell you something.
This sacrifice was first and foremost for God. It's God that
must see the blood. God must see the blood. And that's
what he says here. He said, and he obtained eternal
redemption for us. The price of our redemption was
the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. We were slaves. We couldn't set
ourselves free. Slaves to sin. Slaves to self. Slaves to our flesh. Slaves to
our vain conversation. Slaves to our tradition. And
our Lord Jesus Christ Just like Israel and Egypt. God brought
them out with power and blood. And that Passover was sacrificed
just for them. And God brought them out with
power and blood. And when Christ's blood was presented
to God Himself in glory, He went in there once. Just once. That's
all it took. Just once. He ain't going to
go again. He never went before. He never went before and he's
never going again. And he went there with his own blood. God
smelled that sweet smell and savored the Lord Jesus Christ.
And the Scriptures tells us, beloved, that once is enough.
If you have the right offering, if you have the right sacrifice,
once is enough. And once to show us the way is
now open and that there's one entrance into the presence of
God. And then look what else it says here that He did for
us. What His offering done for us.
Obtained eternal redemption for us. Oh my, you bought with a price.
We've been redeemed from our false condition. We're no longer
without the veil. We're no longer ways separated
from God. We've been redeemed from our
guilt. Redeemed from our sin. If there ain't no sin, there
can be no guilt. And there's three eternal things here. First
of all, you have eternal redemption. And then in verse 14, you have
the eternal Spirit who offered Himself through the eternal Spirit
without spot to God. And in verse 15, He gave us the
promise of an eternal inheritance. And you're talking about eternal
redemption. You know eternal is a long, long word. That's
a long word. It's a long word. It's not just
a limited period. You know, when he talks about
eternal redemption, that doesn't mean that you know you're redeemed
until you sin again, or until you backslide. No, no. When we have eternal
redemption, that means our sin was put away once, And eternally. You know, God's an eternal God.
And the sacrifice that Christ our Lord offered, when He offered
Himself once, it had eternal consequences. God said He is
the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. And if He is slain
from the foundation, it has eternal consequences. You know, all my
sins were future when Christ entered once into that holy place.
All of them were future. And all the sins that I have
now that are present, they're covered under that eternal redemption.
And all the sins that I'm going to commit in the future must
take care of under this eternal redemption. Sin was put away
once. If it's put away once, what are
we going to do about it? Does that mean we've got to do
something else? No, no. And oh, beloved, by His
blood He dealt with eternal things. Eternal things. He had dealt
with eternal things like sin. You know, when a man dies in
his sin, he'll be a sinner all the way through eternity. If
he dies hating God, he'll hate God as long as he lives in eternity. If he has enmity in his heart
for God, he'll have it all through eternity. People say, people
will give anything. There are a lot of believers
in hell. No, no, there's not. There's not a one. No, no. Whatever condition eternity finds
a man, if it finds him in his sin, if it finds him in rebellion,
if it finds him in hunger and thirst after something, he'll
always hunger and thirst after that and never be satisfied.
Because sin has such eternal consequences. Sin has such a
dark, horrible, Consequence to it, that it took an eternal sacrifice,
an eternal redemption to put it away. And he dealt with eternal
things. He dealt with sin. He dealt with
death. Death was an eternal thing. Dying
and never dying. Our Lord says, suffering and
yet never cease to suffer. The fire that's never quenched
and the worm that never dies. Hell is an eternal thing. Hell
is an eternal thing. None of these things are temporary.
And that's why he obtained eternal redemption for us. Sin's gone.
Death's gone. Hell is gone. Satan is gone,
as far as his ability to do anything to us. Eternal redemption covers
all that will come upon us in this life. It covers all of our
troubles, all of our trials, all of our temptations. And not
only covers our past and future, but even our presence. And we're
going to get old. We're going to get old. And some of us will get old and
we won't remember even who we are. Or we don't even remember where
we are. You know, how many people have
we seen out of this congregation die and they know nothing when
they lay there the last few hours? Didn't know nothing. You could
talk to them. They didn't hear you. Where you at? What's your name? And we're going to get old, and
we're going to maybe can't remember who and where we are, but, oh,
listen. That won't matter one hour. Won't
you be glad? And are you glad now that he
obtained eternal redemption? And who did he retain it for?
For us. For us. For us. And then let
me show you this quickly, and I'll hurry. Over here in verse
10. Chapter 10. Excuse me. Chapter
10, verse 10. This not only put away sin once,
our Lord's sacrifice, put away sin once. Not only did he obtain
eternal redemption for us when he entered into that holy place
and offered himself without spot to God and entered in there with
his own blood, but he also made us holy. Hebrews 10.10. By the witch will we are sanctified,
now watch this, through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ.
And here's that word once again. Everything he's done, you know,
God doesn't want this enough. Oh, beloved, listen. There's
threefold sanctification in the Scriptures. And it says, you
know, there's one that's called setting apart, as like the firstborn
was sanctified, set apart for holy use for the Lord's people. Men are cattily the one. And
then secondly, it means to be regarded or treated or declared
to be holy. Regarded as holy, treated like
the holy, and declared to be holy. We're that in Christ. And then to actually purify and
make holy by applying the blood. And beloved, we are all three
of those things. We have been regarded holy, declared
holy, and treated holy, actually purified and made holy, and been
set apart by the gospel and by the Holy Spirit in the gospel
and by the truth. And this is how we are sanctified
through the offering again of the body of Jesus Christ once
and for all. Our sins were put away once.
Eternal redemption was obtained for us once. Our sanctification,
all by this sacrifice that He offered. And then it says, once and for
all. What does that mean? That means it has perpetual validity,
not requiring repetition. Perpetual validity. Is that valid? People say all the time, somebody's
trying to validate their lives, they're trying to validate their
reason for existence, trying to validate this, that, and the
other. Well, would you validate my parking ticket, you know?
Would you make it legal? Well, listen, this is a perpetual
validity where that word counts in God's sight. In God's sight. And all beloved, down in Hebrews
10.14, it says, For by one offering he hath perfected forever them
that are sanctified. Once and for all, once and for
all, all sin. Once and for all, all time. Once
and for all, all his people. Once and for all, all that God
required. Once and for all. He put away
sin. Once and for all. He obtained
eternal redemption for us. Once. He suffered. Once. He sanctified us. Once. He entered
once into the holy place. Once. Then you have to do something
over and over and over and over. God don't. Christ didn't. Our Father, in the blessed, holy,
glorious name of the Lord Jesus Christ, thank you for that sacrifice. Thank you for that blood, this
eternal redemption, this eternal sanctification. And it's all
done once. It was done once for all time,
once for all you people, once for all you required. And so,
Lord, we bless you at once, and we come. And Lord, as the priest
put his hands upon the head of that goat or that bullock, Lord,
we identify with you. We confess with our heart and
soul, with our very being, with everything that's within us. We acknowledge what you did.
Acknowledge that's what we need. And we look no place else or
look for nothing else again. We look for no sin ever to be
put away again. We look for no greater sanctification. We look for no more blessed redemption
than what we have, what you did for us. Every priest has to offer
something. Lord, you offered yourself. And
we thank you for that. That body you offered, that soul
you offered, that self you offered, we bless you for it in Christ's
name. Amen. Amen.