We are in Hebrews 11 again this
hour. Hebrews 11, and it's a continuation
of what was just mentioned about the life of Moses. Speaking of
the faith given to Moses, and it brings us to a very important
topic, the most important topic, and that's what I've titled this
message, the blood, the blood. Let's read our text, Hebrews
11, verse 28 and 29. Through faith he kept the Passover
in the sprinkling of blood, lest he that destroyed the firstborn
should touch them. By faith they passed through
the Red Sea, as by dry land which the Egyptians, assaying to do,
were drowned. Faith is the only way you and
I will believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Faith is the only way
you and I will believe in the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Faith is the only way that we'll
look to that as the substance that pleased the Father and the
washing that we require. If we don't have faith, we can't
believe that. We can't believe that. The only
means where God washes and cleanses and saves his elected sinners
is by the blood of the lamb. Either we believe and are looking
to Christ alone, looking to his blood alone, or we're looking
to self. Now, there is no in between. Somebody says, well,
I am looking at the blood. I believe it's the blood alone.
But they add things such as you have to do this or you have to
do that to make it effectual. That's not the blood alone. See,
the Lord's the one that makes the blood effectual. It was effectual
on the cross of Calvary. Whom it was shed for, all of
their sin has been put away on the cross of Calvary. And now
in time, he shows us that he washed away our sin by bringing
us, calling us out of darkness into his light by his gospel.
If we do not have the blood alone, we have no righteousness. Scripture
says, without the shedding of blood, there is no remission
of sin. So if I'm not looking to the blood alone, my sins have
not been remitted. It's the blood that remitted
the sins of the Lord's people. It's the blood that washed them
and made them whiter than snow. What did Isaiah say? He said,
though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as wool, though
they be red like crimson. They shall be whiter than snow,
whiter than snow. How did the Lord do that? He
washed us by his own blood, washed us by his own blood. Now here
in our text and also in Exodus, we see the Passover. By faith,
he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of blood. The Lord
came to Moses, he came to Aaron, and he said, one more plague
will I bring upon Egypt, one more. He said, and they'll let
you go after this one. This was the most devastating
one of them all, for it was the death of the firstborn. And it's
a picture of our Lord having to execute his son on the cross
of Calvary so that you and I could be set free from the bondage
of Egypt, from the bonds of sin and death. And there's only one
thing that prevented us from dying. What was it? It was the
blood. He tells them when I, and I've
never noticed these wording before, this wording, but he says, I
will pass through Egypt. I remember hearing messages in
times past, they call it the death, they call the individual
or the being a death angel. You heard that before? Right
here he's referred to as the destroyer, lest he that destroyed
the first one should touch them. This is God. This is God that
came through Egypt. And he said, there's one thing,
I'll be looking for. And he was plain and simple with
them, plain and clear. And the gospel is plain and clear,
isn't it? It's not complicated, plain and clear. He said, take
a lamb without spot and without blemish, take its blood, kill
it and take its blood and put it on the two side posts and
put it on the top post of the lintel of the door. He said,
whenever I passed through the land of Egypt this night, He
said, I will pass by you when I see the blood. When I see the
blood, I will pass by you. This is something very important
that I pray the Lord allows us to enter into. Although we've
heard it several times, the simplicity of that statement is still true
today. When the Lord sees the blood of Christ on us, He's satisfied with the blood.
He's satisfied with his son. We must have that covering. We
must have that atonement. Without it, we have no hope whatsoever.
He was not looking for their good works. He was not looking
for the way that they dressed. their attitudes, their words,
their deeds, their actions, the life that they lived, the things
that they did or did not do, the law that they kept. He wasn't
looking for any of that. He was looking for one substance,
the blood, the blood. That was it. That was it. And this is why the gospel is
such good news to sinners, because if you've been made a sinner,
you know that there's none good, no not one. There's nothing you
could do that's good or merit anything with God and that your
blood is polluted. So God sent forth his son in
the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin condemned sin in
the flesh. When the fullness of time was come, God sent forth
his son and his blood is holy. His blood is pure. His blood
cleanses Under the Old Testament law, in the book of Leviticus,
it talked about even spit was unclean. So if you were to be
spat upon, you had to go and wash yourself. And until the
end of the day was over, then you would be declared clean again.
You were unclean for a day if you got spit upon. Well, I'll
remind us that the Lord spat upon, made mud out of spittle,
didn't he? And he anointed the eyes of the
blind man. Well, why didn't that make him unclean? Because of
who was doing the spitting. See, the only thing the Lord
can produce is goodness. He touches you, you become whole. He touches you, you become clean.
He washes you, he cleanses you. We can't defile him. We can't
defile him. And what he does is he cleanses
to the uttermost. All that he loves, he cleanses
by his voice, by his blood, by his work alone. The Lord said,
when I see the blood, I'll pass by you. Faith, and that's what's
in, that's the, I said common denominator, that could be called
the theme of this chapter, it could be called a lot of things,
but that's the whole point here, is it's all by faith that we
receive the truth. It's by faith that we believe
in the blood. By faith, we believe in the blood. That's by faith
that we believe that Christ is our justification, that Christ
is our sanctification, that Christ is our redemption, Christ is
all of our covering. In verse 28, it tells us that
he kept the Passover and applied the blood. That's exactly what
our Lord did. You know, you and I couldn't
keep the Passover. Not perfectly. There's many Passovers after
this that was observed. None of them put away sin. None
of them put away sin. It was an appeasement to the
Lord as a reminder. They were able to worship as
a reminder for what would become in the Lord Jesus Christ. It
was a reminder for the blood of the lamb. But none of the
sacrifices of those lambs or those calves or all those animals
could put away sin. The Lord Jesus Christ was the
only one that could do that. So thank God, He, our Passover,
our Lord Jesus Christ, our Sabbath, The Lamb of God, he kept the
Passover perfectly for the sacrifice of himself, shedding his blood
and he applied the blood. Notice it says here, he kept
the Passover in the sprinkling of blood. That's what Christ
does. He sanctifies, he cleanses his
people, he sprinkles them in his own blood. and they are declared
clean in the sight of God. They are declared good in the
sight of God. They are declared perfect in
the sight of God, and they're thoroughly washed from every
sin and stain. Think about the Lord shedding
his blood. He applied it to the mercy seat, didn't he? Guess
where God said, I'll meet with you. Lord said, that mercy seat
represents Christ. I mean, there's no doubt about
that. But at the same time, there was a physical worship that took
place on that mercy seat. This is where God said, this
is the one place I'll meet with you, that you will not be destroyed.
It's at the mercy seat. And that's the only place that
he'll meet with us now is it's Christ, our mercy seat. And Christ
having the blood, applying it to the mercy seat, us being in
him, the father said, satisfied. Well, please sit down here on
my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool. Sit down,
your work's finished. Hebrews chapter one says, when
he had by himself purged our sins, he sat down. How did he
purge our sin? By his own blood. By his own blood, he entered
once into the holy place. Why? Because he had already obtained
mercy. He had already attained grace.
He had already obtained salvation. He entered once into the holy
place, having obtained redemption for his people. There is now therefore no condemnation
to them which are in Christ Jesus. Why? They've been washed in the
blood of the lamb. There's no condemnation. Either
we're looking to the blood or we have condemnation upon us.
It's that simple. He said, there's no condemnation
to them which are in Christ. Why? They're looking to Christ
alone. They're looking to the blood alone. If you're in Christ,
he's gonna give you faith and cause you to look at him. He's
gonna give me faith and cause me to look at him. But if he
doesn't do that, there's condemnation upon me. There's judgment upon
me still. There's sin upon me still. Some say they believe the blood's
a key element to eternal life. Then they add something to it.
And I know we use that term a lot because it's so serious. It's
such a very serious matter. We can't add one thing to it
or take away one thing from it. That's why Paul used the statement,
examine yourself, see if you be in the faith. What he meant
by that was, look inside yourself, be honest with yourself, be truthful
with yourself, see if the Lord's given you repentance and faith
to believe Christ. See if there's anything in you that looks to
yourself as any part of your salvation. As any part of your
justification, as any part of your sanctification, that means
if you are looking at something in yourself, you're not looking
to the blood alone, and it's the blood that cleanses from
every stain, isn't it? If you add or take away one thing
from the blood, you don't have the blood. Lord said you have
to have just the blood, and you have to have the lamb, and you
have to eat it completely, whole. And he said, you have to consume
the whole entire thing. You can't take the parts that
you like. You can't take the parts of the gospel that we like.
We can't say, okay, it's the blood plus this, or it's this
plus this. It's the body of Christ, yeah,
but it's also my lifestyle and what I do. No, he says you have
to take the body and the blood alone. That's it, Christ alone.
He tells them in Exodus chapter 12, you gotta eat it not raw.
Why? Because it had to be burnt with
fire. It had to be burnt with the fire of the Lord, didn't
it? It's a picture of the wrath that fell upon Christ. And well,
he was putting away our sin on the cross of Calvary. He also
says, can't sodden it with water. You can't water it down. Can't
eat it watered down. And that's what men do. They
water down this gospel. They water down the truth that
it's the blood alone. They add something to, or they take something
away from it. It's watering it down. That's what he's telling
them. That's what he's telling them. You can't do that. He said,
roast it with fire, his head with his legs and with the pertinence.
Thereof, you can't have Christ your way. You have to have Christ
God's way. The only way to have Christ is
God's way. And thanks be to God, he gives us a new want to where
we want Christ, God's way. We want Christ, God's way. What
is that? That Christ is all in salvation. Christ's blood alone purges sin. Christ's blood alone cleansed
every stain for whom he was dying on the cross of Calvary. Christ
Jesus saved sinners by his own blood. There is righteousness in no
other. Scripture says there's no other name given among men
whereby we must be saved, and there's no other substance that
cleanses. A lot of people believe baptism literally washes sins
away. Did you know that? There's different religions that
believe that. It's not true. It's not true. We can't do anything
physical. We can't do anything physical
to get rid of one sin. It doesn't work that way. Everything
that's done by us getting rid of sin is just us finding out
God had to do that. We can't put away sin. We can't
put away sin. No, we can get, you can get dunked,
but it ain't gonna change the fact that we're sinners. No,
there's only one substance that can put away sin, and it's the
blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And if I don't believe in that
blood as everything in my salvation, I'm not a believer. I'm not saved. I'm not born again. It's the
blood alone. It's the blood alone. It's the
finished work of Christ alone. He told his disciples, this is my
body. We're gonna take communion here. Well, hard to believe next
week's the last week of December. We're getting close to the end
of the year already. So we're gonna be taking communion in a couple
weeks. But he told his disciples, this is my body broken for you.
My body broken for you. And he told them, this is my
blood shed. for the remission of sins. The remission of sins. It's the only way that the sins
you and I have, the sin that you and I are, the depravity
that we are, the only way it can be put away is His precious
blood. And He shed it. He shed it, an
offering to His Father on behalf of His people. And the Father
sees that offering on behalf of His people and He says, satisfied.
Not just with Christ, but every single person that Christ died
for that was in Christ when he died. See, his blood is holy. It's
not polluted like ours. Everything we are is polluted,
isn't it? I had it wrote down that everything we do is polluted,
but everything we are and do is polluted. But you know, everything
he does is not. It's not polluted at all. Everything
he is is perfect and holy and right and good. And likewise,
everything he does is perfect and holy and right and good. Why? Well, our blood is polluted
and his is not. His is not. He bore our sin in
his body on the tree, but he never sinned. He never sinned. He never broke God's law. He
was made to be sinned for us who knew no sin. He was burying
him on his body on the tree, the scripture says, and put him
away. And put him away by the sacrifice himself. But the sacrifice
was never tainted. It was never tainted. He stayed
perfect, He stayed righteous, as He always will. Otherwise,
He's not God, because God can't change. Everything He is and does is
perfectly righteous and right and good and pure, because He
has perfect blood, whereby He saved His people from their sin. I said this already, but I'm
gonna say it again. Everything we touch, we defile, because
our blood, not Him. Everything He touches, He purifies.
It's so the opposite, isn't it? He can't defile anything, He's
God. He's God, everything He touches,
He purifies. Remember the woman with the issue
of blood? She knew, we've mentioned this, I think, Wednesday night,
but because we're dealing with blood again, and it's an issue
of blood that she had for 12 years, and some of you were not present
for that, so I'll repeat some of the things I said, but the
woman with the issue of blood, she had it for 12 years. And
she spent all that she had on the physicians and they couldn't
help her. And the interesting part, you can look this up, the
interesting part is, is what they would do back then in order
to try to cure somebody of their ailment is they would bloodlet,
meaning they would cause them to bleed more. They thought if
we can get rid of the blood, that's where the problem is, it'll get
rid of the sickness. Matter of fact, that's how George
Washington died. He had a cold and they bloodlet and he'd lost
too much blood, he died. Did you know that? Well, that's what
this woman, she had done all this. She said, I've done everything
I can. Well, that's false religion, isn't it? That's all that false
religion can do is just make us bleed this blood of unrighteousness. That's the wrong blood. It ain't
gonna work. It ain't gonna fix anything. But she heard about
a man. She heard about the master. She
heard about the savior. She heard about the Lord Jesus
Christ. And she said, if I could but touch the hem of his garment,
I know. I know I'll be made whole. There was a great throng, a great
crowd of people around him, and it was difficult, no doubt, for
her to get. And she pressed her way. I could see her crawling
through it. However she had to get to him, she did it. That's
what it is to come to Christ. You come in desperation, don't
you? It's like, I got to have him. I gotta have him right now.
That's why scripture says today is the day of salvation, because
I have to have him right now. Not, yes I have to have him tomorrow,
but my need is ever present. I need him now, and then I need
him now. And every time that clock ticks another second, I
need him now. She needed him now, and it was urgent. It was
an emergency. Life and death. She crawls to
him, gets to him, and it's evident that she was crawling to some
degree, because she was touching the hem of his garment. That's down
around his feet, is it not? She had to get pretty low to do that.
Well, that's how you have to come to Christ, low, meek, pleading
the blood alone. Not my blood, Lord, is gonna
help me anymore. Nothing I can do and produce in this body by
what these hands do. It's gonna have to be what your
blood produced, what you did with your hands. And she touches
his garment, doesn't she? And the Lord says, somebody touch
me. And the disciples, oh, we're just like the disciples. You
don't understand the things of the Lord. Sometimes he's shown
us some things that we believe by faith. That's the only way
we can believe. But, oh, his ways are too high. You know,
his ways are not our ways. He said, somebody touched me.
The disciple says, well, Lord, a bunch of people's touched you.
You know, there's a big crowd. And he said, no, virtue has gone
out for me. And that's what happens. When
we come to Christ, if he enables us to, if he puts the need there
by faith to come to him, the desire to touch that hem of his
garment. I can just touch the hem, I didn't have to touch his
shoulder, didn't have to touch his head, just the very bottom, just let
me touch anything about him. And virtue will go out of him
onto me. He'll cleanse me. How do you know? Because that's
what he does, that's who he is. Everything I touch I defile.
I can't defile him. Can't defile him. As a matter
of fact, he makes me virtuous. if we can just put touch to him
of his garment. And then she was made to confess everything
to him. And she did. She told him everything. And he said, thy faith has made
thee whole. Thy faith has made thee whole.
Looking to Christ and His blood alone, the Lord has given faith
to do so. If we don't have faith, we cannot
look to the blood alone. We'll still look to ourself,
we'll still bloodlet, we'll still try to figure out how to get
to Him, and it's not gonna do us any good. We have a sin problem,
a bleeding problem, and we can't get rid of it. We can't get rid
of it, but God did. for his people, God did for his
people. The Lord hath laid upon him the
iniquity of us all, of us all. This woman came to the best place
a sinner can be brought to, rock bottom, rock bottom, complete
desperation. Somebody said, boy, sometimes
life gets really hard. That's the best place you can
be. Did you know that? Because that's when you'll cry
out for mercy unto the Lord. You say, well, my flesh don't
like it. Nope, it don't. It does not. But the sweeter,
the sweeter the, trying to remember that quote. I can't quite remember
it. The harder the struggle, the harder the struggle, when
you finally see his face, the sweeter the Lord becomes. The
more difficult the trial, the more precious his redemption
becomes. When you see your sin, the more
needful you are of the blood of Christ to cleanse you from
it. He's the one with perfect blood,
the one who is the fountain of life. He is the crystal river
flowing from the throne of God, the river of life. He is the
trees on each side that bear all manner of fruit that has
healing for the nations. He is God, Lord Jesus Christ. The only
one that has cleansing, the only one that has healing, the only
one that has salvation, because he is salvation. And without
him, there is no salvation. You must have the blood. It's
the only way not to receive the wrath of God. God is looking
for the blood. He said, when I see the blood,
I'll pass by you. I'll pass by you. Notice what the blood guarantees. We have a guarantee. I love the
Lord's promises, the Lord's guarantees, but look at verse 29. By faith
they passed through the Red Sea as by dry land, which the Egyptians
a saying to do were drowned. The blood guarantees safe passage
through death. The blood guarantees If you have
been, if the Lord Jesus Christ has applied the blood, then you
have peace with God, and you needn't fear death. Because when
Christ died on the cross, his people died in him, died unto
death. So Paul put it this way, O death,
where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?
Death is swallowed up in victory. There is no death for the believer
anymore. Now does this body, this immortal,
Is this mortal put on immortality? The body goes back to the dust
from whence it came? Absolutely, that'll be the single death that
we'll experience. There's a second death. And Christ
Jesus was the end of that second death for all of the Lord's people.
We needn't fear that death. He'll say unto his chosen people,
enter in, thou good and faithful servant, thou hast been faithful
over a few things, I'll make you ruler over many. And I love
this thought that his people bear his image. And what is it
we plead the entire time we're there? Worthy is the lamb. We plead the blood alone, don't
we? That's not gonna change. It's not gonna change. Because
God accepted the offering of Christ, he accepts his people
on his behalf. He accepts the blood of Christ.
The father said satisfied. And all those that were in him,
when he died, they died in him. All those that were resurrected,
all those that were in him when he was resurrected, we were resurrected.
in him as well. Now he's seated at the right
hand of the Father. And guess where the Lord's people
are? Guess where you and I are? We're
seated in the heavenlies at the right hand of the Father. Somebody
said, that doesn't make any sense. No, not to the flesh, but through
the eyes of faith, we believe that to be so because God said
it and he cannot lie. He cannot lie. This is what the
power of the blood accomplished. This is what the Lord's blood
actually accomplished. We live in a society, we live in a day
and time, and it's always been, even all the way, go back to
Cain and Abel. They was, you had the blood on one hand and
works on the other. It's always been here, but it's predominant. Men do not preach the power of
the blood anymore. It's not effectual like to them
like it truly is. I'm talking about the substance
that truly put away the sin of God's people. Gone. Absolutely
gone. Never to be remembered again.
Never to be remembered again. Not as if they never happened. They never happened. That's how
God operates. He took the sin that we are,
the sin that we do, and made it go away. so that it never
ever happened. That is the good news of the
gospel. How did he do that? By his own blood. He purged our
sin. He broken by doing all this,
he broke the chains of death and silenced the grave once and
for all. Now, if you come to this river, if you come to this
crossing, the Jordan River, the death, the river of death, And
there's a couple of different places where that's a picture
in scripture. If you come to this without the blood, you will
be consumed. You will be destroyed. He will
not be there for you and with you. But thanks be to God, he
tells us in Psalm 23, yea, though I walk through the valley of
the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort
me. See, it's the blood that has cleansed every stain. And
by receiving that blood, we are the adopted sons and daughters
of the King of glory. You heard Al read 1 John 3, behold
what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us that we
should be called the sons of God. Brethren, now are we the
sons of God. How is that possible? By the
blood of Christ alone. If you come to this river, pleading that blood, precious
blood of the lamb, it dries up, doesn't it? It's got nothing
else to say to the believer who's already died into it, already
served his time. Well, when did I do that? In
Christ on the cross. The river can't say anything
to you. It has no hold on you, no claim on the child of God.
The sea will part its deadly ways and you will have safe passage
to the glorious presence of God. Safe passage to the glorious
presence of God. The blood is the token of the
finished work of God. The blood is the token of the
finished work of God. We have it as a token. That's
what it is. It represents Christ was successful. Christ was successful. The blood
is the salvation of God's elect. the key to eternal life. Romans
chapter three tells us this, being justified freely by his
grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom
God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to
declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are
passed through the forbearance of God, to declare, I say at
this time, his righteousness, that he might be just and justifier
of them that believeth. How is he just and justifier?
The blood. The blood of the Lord Jesus Christ,
that's how. The blood, without the blood
there is no justification of the Lord's people. Christ satisfied
his father's demands and now God's given his children a clear
and clean title. Clean title, not a spot, not
a blemish, not a stain, not a wrinkle. There's no condemnation any longer,
no condemnation. It says in Ephesians 1, according
as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world,
that we should be holy and without blame before him in love, having
predestinated us into the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to
himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the
praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted
in the beloved, in whom we have redemption through his blood. the forgiveness of sins according
to the riches of his grace. How do you make us accepted in
the beloved? His own blood. How do we have forgiveness of
sins? His own blood. And how did he give us the blood
according to the riches of his grace? For by grace are you saved. That's how the blood is given. That's how the blood is applied
is by grace alone. Outside the blood there is no
forgiveness. Outside the blood, there is no
forgiveness. There is no remedy. There is no redemption. Outside the blood of Christ,
there is none. Lord said this, when I see the blood, I'll pass
by you. Nothing else. He's looking for the blood. So
my question in closing is this, what are you looking to as your
righteousness before God? What are you looking to as your
righteousness before God? What are you looking to as the
token of your acceptance before God, as the substance of your
righteousness before God, as your hope of eternal life. What
are you looking to? What token are you counting on
for safe passage through death? It has to be the blood, doesn't
it? It has to be the blood. Otherwise, there is no justification.
There's no substitute for it. There's no salvation beside of
it. There's no life. There's no righteousness. There's
no goodness outside of the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. We
have to have the blood. We have to have the blood. Outside
the precious blood of the Lord Jesus, there is no other source
of life and righteousness. It's the only substance given.
It's the only substance given with this promise. When I see
the blood, I'll pass by you. It's the only time the Lord's
ever said that. Didn't say when I see your good works. He didn't
say when I see your faith. He said when I see the blood.
See, if the blood's been applied, he's gonna give you faith. But
that blood, the Lord Jesus Christ, is our justification, isn't it?
When I see the blood, I'll pass by you. Let's pray. Father, bless this to our understanding
for your glory. Cause us to plead and believe
in your blood alone. As only you can. In Christ's
name we pray. Amen.