Hebrews chapter nine, if you
would like to turn there. Here in our text, we have the
explanation of two elements in the previous verse, the Testament
and that which the Testament is dependent upon. You have the
Testament, what the Lord said he's going to do, what he has
done and what it depended upon. It depended upon the death of
the Lord Jesus Christ. The Testament is the new covenant
or the new Testament. New Testament, the new covenant
is the promise of eternal inheritance. That's what I've titled this
message, eternal inheritance. This should be viewed, what we're
about to read, as a last will and testament of our Lord. Just
as we have last wills that we give and write whenever we come
to the end of our journey, when we pass away, our will is read,
and that which we have decided we wanted to do with our things
or our desires, we bring those forth. And the one riding the
wheel is called the testator, the testator. But there's another
one that's involved with it after you pass that has to be the one
that guarantees everything to get done, the guarantor or the
executor of it. Like every single wheel, it's
dependent upon death. If you don't, the will doesn't
go into effect until after you're deceased, right? It doesn't take
effect. It's never, it never is implemented
until after death. That's exactly what he's declaring
here in our text. Let's read this together. Hebrews nine,
we're gonna read 15 through 22. And for this cause, He is the
mediator of the New Testament, that by means of death for the
redemption of the transgressions that were under the First Testament,
they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.
For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the
death of the testator. For a testimony is of force after
men are dead, otherwise it is of no strength at all while the
testator liveth. Whereupon neither the first Testament
was dedicated without blood, for when Moses had spoken every
precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood
of calves and of goats with water and scarlet and wool and hyssop
and sprinkled both the book and all the people saying, This is
the blood of the Testament, which God hath enjoined unto you. Moreover, he sprinkled the blood,
both the tabernacle and all the vessels of the ministry, and
almost all things are by the law purged with blood. And without
shedding of blood, there is no remission." Without the shedding
of blood, there is no remission. Everything about God's salvation
And we have to call it that because he is the author and finisher
of faith. He is the originator of salvation. It's his salvation for his people. He owns it. It's his. He bought
it with his own blood. Everything about it is dependent
upon him saying, I will. I will. I will save you and you
will be saved. I will call you and you will
be called. I will keep you and you will
be kept. Everything about God's salvation is dependent upon him.
If he doesn't say I will and perform his word, we have no
hope. And that's what this Testament
represents here. God satisfying God. That's what
it took. God had to satisfy God. You and
I cannot satisfy God. God had to satisfy God. And that's
what this Testament The First Testament was dependent upon
men's performance. The Second Testament is entirely
dependent upon the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ. The
First one was dependent upon what you did in order to try
to honor the law. But really it was only to show
us that man cannot please God. Man at his best state is altogether
vanity. They that are in the flesh cannot
please God. That's what the First Covenant showed. Couldn't come
to God by the merits of ourself. Only the high priest could enter
in once every year into the holy place. And that was to offer
blood. So we had no hope of pleasing
God under that covenant. Nothing about eternal inheritance
is dependent upon man's cooperation, man's choice, man's performance,
man's contribution. This is being written to show
us no one can be saved by their own works. No one can be saved
by their own deeds or actions. No one can be saved by a morality
change. It takes what? The blood of Christ,
because without shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin. No one's saved by doing, to the
contrary. It's all by God's free and sovereign
grace. Somebody asked me the other day,
why didn't you, why don't you name the church, uh, only sovereign
grace church? I said, well, I'd be redundant.
And they said, what do you mean? I said, there's only one kind
of grace, sovereign grace, free grace, God's grace. There are
only one kind. There's not a bunch of different
graces. God's grace is sovereign. He gives it to whom he will as
he chooses. He's he's the sovereign God.
Only one kind of grace. It's sovereign. This is what
the eternal inheritance of God's people, it's dependent upon that. Our eternal inheritance is dependent
upon God's sovereign grace. And where is that found? Well,
it's found in the Lord Jesus Christ, isn't it? All good gifts
are found in Christ, in Christ. God's will, God's testament,
God's choice to elect, to redeem, Everyone that he died for, this
is the message of hope for our eternal inheritance, Christ and
him crucified. There's our hope. That's all
our acceptance before God. His blood is our righteousness
before God. His death caused his people to
never have to die. His resurrection proved that
we were justified. Being justified freely by what?
His grace. Being justified by his blood.
Being justified by what he accomplished. This is the hope of the believer.
This eternal inheritance is something that we can't understand because
it never had a beginning and it never had an end. It's everlasting. That's the same word as everlasting.
Eternal inheritance. That means if you're in Christ,
you've always been in Christ. You've never not been in Christ.
That's good news. You can't get out of it. Can't
mess it up. He's put you there, he put you
there. All this was dependent upon the
testator, the one that made the last will, the one that made
his will. The covenant of grace, the Lamb's
book of life, he wrote them. And we have the substance of
the new covenant is the blood. The old covenant was not a will. It wasn't a last will and testament. Although a lot of animals died,
none of those animals could bring about life with their death,
but Christ did. When he died, we died in him. When he was resurrected, we were
resurrected in him. His death brought life, and he's
the only one that could have done that. He's the only one
that could have done that. Nothing else can put away sin.
Nothing else could put away sin, yet we see under the old covenant
that it was entirely dependent upon man's cooperation, man's
effort, man's doing. And men today are still doing
that. They are still doing something. They're still trying something.
They're still working something. Not the Lord's people. No, it's
His life. It's His work. It's His death,
burial, and resurrection. It's His blood alone that is
our acceptance before God. We see that's evident because
the first covenant failed. It was unable to redeem. Not
one person was redeemed under that old covenant, not one. Christ
is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. The
old covenant merely revealed man could not please God. This
is why it's blasphemy to turn to the old covenant, try to find
righteousness. You're literally saying, well, Christ died, but
I have to do my part also. Yeah, it's his blood, but it's
also something I have to do, and that's why it's blasphemous.
No, it's Christ alone. That's it. That's it. Our flesh
wants to do something. That's just how we are by nature.
The first thing that happens whenever something breaks physically
around you, what do you do? You try to fix it. We're geared
that way. We're made up that way. That's
how we are. What did Adam and Eve do whenever the first sin
that ever happened? They knew that they were naked.
They knew that sin entered, that good and evil, the knowledge
of good and evil entered. What did they do? Did they say,
Lord, have mercy on me, the sinner? No, they tried to fix it. They
sowed fig leaves together. And that's what men do all by
nature. That's what men are doing today is they're going back to
that law, trying to establish a righteousness and it's called
dead works. And that's what the writer here
in Hebrews was saying just a bit before that he's purged our conscience
from dead works. We no longer go to the law. We
no longer go to the fig leaves. We come to the Lord Jesus Christ
to obtain mercy and find grace to help in the time of need. Verse 15, he's called the mediator
of the new covenant. This new covenant was entirely
dependent upon the obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ, not
our obedience. And what was that obedience unto?
It was unto death. Isn't that what he said? Verse 15, and for this cause,
he was the mediator of the New Testament that by means of death
for the redemption of the transgressors that were under the First Testament
had to die. He had to die, that was the obedience.
Turn with me to Philippians chapter two. Philippians two, look at
verse five through 11. Let this mind be in you, which
was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, thought
it not robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation
and took upon him the form of a servant and was made in the
likeness of men. And being found in fashion as
a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death."
There it is. Became obedient unto death, even
the death of the cross. Wherefore? means because of this
God also hath highly exalted him and given him a name which
is above every name that at the name of Jesus every knee should
bow of things in heaven and things on earth and things under the
earth and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is
Lord to the glory of God the Father." Every knee is going to bow and
every tongue is going to confess that he's Lord whether whether
they do it here or whether they do it before his throne when
they get there. We see that the Lord had to be
obedient unto death and that death pleased the father in so
much that he exalted him higher than any, gave him a name above
every name. This is what his death accomplished.
This is what he did to obtain our eternal inheritance. The law demands justice for transgression,
meaning that me and you have a death sentence whenever we're
born. We're sinners by nature, sinners by practice, sinners
by choice. What does the law demand? Justice for that sin,
for transgression. So we had no hope of redeeming
ourself, no righteousness that we can achieve, therefore, when
the fullness of time came, God became a man, born under the
law to redeem them that were under the law. He was born to
die, die to redeem so that you and I could have an eternal inheritance. Remember what he told the disciples,
I go away to prepare a place for you. And if I go, I will
come again and receive you unto myself that where I am there,
you may be also. I remember in false religion, they had songs
that said, I've got a mansion just over the hilltop. You ever
heard that one? Everybody clap and cry and get all excited.
I got a mansion. I live in a shack down here, but the Lord's made
me a mansion over there. That's not what heaven's about. Heaven's
about one person, the Lord Jesus Christ. Heaven's about seeing
him face to face, being made like him. And that place he's
talking about is in him. There's the place. I go to prepare
a place for you. We have a place in glory because
of what Christ accomplished. It wouldn't matter to me if I'm
a doormat. I just want to be there. You
understand what I'm saying. I don't need people to talk about
a mansion and all that. It's just silly. It's just carnal,
isn't it? No, I want to see him face to
face. I want to worship him. I want to sit at his feet like
Mary did, hear his words. That's the heart that he gives
a believer. It's not about us. It's not about
what we're getting. It's about all glory and honor and praise
goes to him. By the grace of God, he bore
the sin of his people in his own body on the tree. He died
the death due us to satisfy the law's demands, to satisfy justice. Scripture says, whenever the
Lord was on the cross, it says, awake, O sword, smite the shepherd,
smite the shepherd. The Lord had to die. When thou
shalt make his soul an offering for sin, thou shalt be satisfied.
With his sacrifice, the Lord Jesus Christ justified many.
This is what his obedience accomplished. Now any effort to go back to
the old covenant in any way, whether it's the moral law, whether
it's the civil law, whether it's whatever law you want to call
it, the Ten Commandments, whatever it may be. is it's never going
to give righteousness. It's never going to accomplish
anything good. It creates iniquity by trying
to keep it for righteousness sake. If you're trying to keep
it, if you want to be kind to your neighbor, yeah, I think
that's a great thing, but don't do it for righteousness sake.
That's the point. Don't, don't, We can't have a
puffed up mentality. Well, I don't do that like I
used to do. And I don't do this like I used
to do, but now I do this instead. Well, that's just putting a feather
in your hat. That's just saying, look at me, look what I've done.
Look at what I've accomplished. And that's adding righteousness,
but it's really adding iniquity. It's not adding anything, but
nothing good will come of that if you do it for righteousness
sake. But because of his obedience, he took the sin of his people
and all of our iniquity. nailed him to his cross. He obtained
eternal redemption for his people because he purged our sin by
his own blood. He has given us an eternal inheritance. And we talked about peace with
God the first hour a little bit and how the depths of grace the
Lord's shown to us and having peace with, just having peace
with God. You ever, some of you all are married and you ever
fought with your spouse and It's grievous to have fusses and spats. And sometimes you're prideful
and you walk away and it's not grievous at first. But over time,
maybe you start tenderizing a little bit and you think, okay, well,
I want to make this right. I don't want this to keep going.
And you come to your spouse because you love them. And you know what
you want? You want peace. You want peace. We have peace with God. by what the Lord Jesus Christ
accomplished because he took our sin and nailed them to his
tree and cast them into the depths of the sea, the depths of the
sea of forgetfulness, never to be remembered again. We have
peace with him. We come to him saying, Lord,
I'm sorry. Lord, forgive me of my sin. The Lord says, what sin?
It's gone. It's gone. This is what his obedience
accomplished. And this is why going back to
the old covenant is futile. It's futile because he by himself
purged our sin once and for all. This was the will of God. This
was the written will of God. You have it right here in front
of you. This was the written will of God that the Lord would
save his people from their sin. I go with me back to Hebrews
chapter, chapter nine, Hebrews chapter nine. Let's read verse 15, for this
cause He is the mediator of the New Testament, that by means
of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were
under the First Testament, they which are called might receive
the promise of eternal inheritance. For where a testament is, there
must also of necessity be the death of the testator. Because
of the nature of the covenant, Because of the nature of this
covenant, because of the will, because of the, we can call it
the New Testament, we can call it the New Covenant, we can call
it the will, it's all the same thing. It's all the same thing.
Because of the nature of it, all the benefits of God are found
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Everything about the will that
was written, in order for you and I to be a benefactor, we
have to be in Christ. In order for you and I to take
part of it, the Lord had to choose to make us part of it. It's His
will. those who are in Him receive the fullness of eternal life."
Having died He established the will. We just read the testator
has to die. It's necessity the death of the
testator. He had to die in order for it
to take place. Otherwise the one living it will never take
place. That's what He says in verse
17, "'For a testament is of force after men are dead, otherwise
it is no strength at all while the testator liveth.'" So here
we have the Lord who has now died as the testator so that
you and I could be the benefactors, his people, his chosen people
of his will. And what is his will? Call his
name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sin. Call
his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sin.
You know what the glorious beauty
of his will is? finding out that you were written in it before
time ever began. Before time ever began, turn
me to Ephesians one. We talked about that a little
bit earlier, but I want to show us now. What a glorious day it is when
the Lord opens up our eyes and we see that we were written in
his will. A lot of people, they write wills and they may be sneaky
about it and they'll, They'll do something for this person
or something for that person and they'll, you won't know,
but they'll be, they'll be gone and they'll be dead and gone
by the time it's red. So nobody can change it. What are you going
to do? Get mad at person in the grave and he'll do any good.
You know what I'm talking about? You see it in families. Uh, I've
seen it in families have a favorite son or daughter and they get
more than anybody else. And me, people get all mad and been out of shape
over that stuff. They forget one thing. It was the father's
will, not theirs. It was his stuff to do what he
wanted to do with, or it was the mother's will to do what she wanted to
do with. But the most amazing part about the Lord's will is
he's told us what our inheritance is already, and he cannot lie. It's an eternal inheritance.
He's already told us what we're gonna receive. We're gonna receive
the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what we are going to receive
as his people. You can't get any better than that. You have
peace with God now. You have joy with God now. You
have rest in the Lord Jesus Christ. This is what you're going to
obtain. What did he say? And in the world to come, eternal
life. Eternal life. Let's read this,
Ephesians 1 verse 3. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath blessed us with all spiritual
blessings and heavenly places in Christ. 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 unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according
to the good pleasure of what? His will. His will. To the praise of the glory of
his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. What is the reason? We heard
earlier, first hour, the cause. What is the cause of salvation?
His will. His will. He established his
will. He wrote it before time. And
what does your children have to do with your will other than
being a benefactor of it? What do they, they could request
things. I imagine my sister, she was young and mom was talking
about making a will one time and she said, well, you can have
dad's ties and I want mom's jewelry. I thought, well, that's not too
good. That's a true story. I could
make requests. I could say, I want this, dad
or mom. Kids could say the same. But
who's ultimately in charge of the will? The testator, the one
writing the will. They're the determining factor
in who receives what, how much you get, how little you get.
Before time ever began, God chose to redeem a people, chose to
save them. He entered into a covenant called
the covenant of grace and made a will to save his people, to
give us an eternal inheritance, eternal inheritance. All the
benefits, all the benefits are found in Christ Jesus and all
the benefits are given to his people freely by his grace. And if you and I have the control
over our, and I understand, what I mean by that is the Lord gives
us the grace to make decisions. Scripture says the lot falls
in the lap, but the whole disposing is of the Lord, so we're without
excuse whenever it comes time to make a will or to do something,
do it in prayer. Say, Lord, lead, guide me, teach me, help me,
make me, cause me not to fall on my face, whatever it may be.
But if we have somewhat control over our will that we're riding,
How much more the creator of the universe, he made time for
this very reason. He made the world for this very
reason. He made the sun for this reason. He made the trees and
the, everything that he made was for this purpose, to redeem
his people. Who can stay his hand or who
can say unto him, what doest thou? No, the potter has power
over the clay to make one vessel of honor and another to dishonor.
He's supreme. in his power, it's his right
by God, his sovereign right to do what he will. All the benefits
of salvation, the eternal inheritance of God's elect are found in Christ,
given to his people before time according to his will. Look at
verse 11. In whom also we have obtained
inheritance. That's past tense, isn't it?
We have obtained, that's past tense. He's already given it
to us. Being predestinated according
to the purpose of Him who worketh all things after the counsel
of His own will, that we should be to the praise of His glory
who first trusted in Christ, in whom you also trusted after
that you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation,
in whom also after that you relieved, you were sealed with the Holy
Spirit of promise. Which is the earnest, of our
inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession unto
the praise of His glory." He does the choosing. He does the
saving. He does the keeping. He does
all of it. The calling. He sealed His people. He sealed His people. That's
the eternal inheritance. That's what that is. That's the
eternal inheritance according to His will. According to His
own, the counsel. He works all things after the
counsel of His own will. How do I know if I've obtained
this inheritance? Well, do you believe the Lord Jesus Christ
successfully redeemed his people? Do you believe you're the chief
sinner that needs a savior? If you do, believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ. He can save to the uttermost. He's not limited. If you, don't ask yourself, how
am I living? Don't ask yourself, am I doing
things the right way? No, no. Are you a sinner in need
of a savior? Are you, because if you are,
there is, a storehouse full of grace that the Lord says, come
unto me and I'll give you rest. But you have to deny yourself
completely. You can't go to the law anymore for righteousness.
In order to have eternal inheritance, you can't go to the law. You
can't go to doing things. You come to Christ without moving
a muscle. You come to him with the eyes
of faith that he bestows. You literally run to him without
moving a muscle. You'd say, well, that doesn't
make sense. It does if you've done it. We constantly are fleeing
to the Lord, aren't we? Every day, Lord, save me. Lord,
save me. That's fleeing to him. Lord,
save me. Somebody said, well, I've already done that. I got
saved once. No, it's not a one-time thing. No, Lord, save me now. Lord, save me now. If we started
saying that right now until the day we die, I mean, we never
would say it enough. Lord, save me now. And it's not
unbelief. It's that you know that he's completely sovereign.
And if he doesn't save you, there's nothing that you're going to
be able to do to save yourself. Lord, save me. You're going to
have to do it. And that's what we cry over and
over and over. And we never get tired of saying
it, do we? Never get tired of saying it. Especially because
when we see his face, he says, you've already obtained the eternal
inheritance. You've already obtained it. In
whom also we have obtained an eternal inheritance being predestinated
according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after
the counsel of his will. Now let's go back to Hebrews
chapter 9, and we'll close here. Verse 15 tells us, and for this
cause he is the mediator of the New Testament, that by means
of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were
under the First Testament, they which are called might receive
the promise of eternal inheritance. For where a testament is, there
must also of necessity be the death of the testator. For a
testament is of force after men are dead, otherwise it is of
no strength at all while the testator liveth. Whereupon neither
the first testament was dedicated without blood. For when Moses
had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law,
how he took the blood of calves and of goats with water and scarlet
wool and hyssop and sprinkled both the book and all the people
saying, this is the blood of the Testament which God hath
enjoined you. Moreover, he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle
and all the vessels of the ministry and almost all things are by
the law purged with blood and without the shedding of blood
there is no remission. When you have a will, You are a testator. And after you die, the appointed
executive must be the one that honors your will. Whether it's
a governor, whether it's a mayor, whether it's a judge, the appointed
executive that you chose is the one that has to make certain
that your will is carried out. There's been times where I've
seen somebody have a will and family didn't honor it. Family
didn't honor it. They said, no, we're not going
to do that. We're going to do it our way. And they didn't honor the will.
And they were not good executives,
were they? But here's the glorious news
of the gospel, the Lord's gospel. The Lord Jesus Christ is not
only the testator, but he's also the executive. Having died, Having
died, the testator is passed so that the will is now enacted.
The will is activated, the will is established. But being resurrected,
being resurrected as the eternal God, just as he was as a man,
he is also, he is also the executive. The Lord Jesus Christ is both.
Romans 4.25 says, who was raised, who was delivered for our offenses
and was raised again because of our justification. He was
raised again. If he is the testator and the
executive as God, what could prevent his will from coming
to pass? What could stop it? You pass and I pass. The executive
may be our children. We may pick a judge. Our will
may not come to pass. Maybe somebody don't like it.
They get their feathers ruffled. They find a loophole and they say,
no, this ain't gonna happen this way or not. But God is the testator
and the executive. Who is going to stop His will? No one. No one can. I rest in
that. That's rest for the believer.
I can rest in that. He is the executive. He's the one that's going to
make certain that it comes to pass. He's seated, matter of
fact, it's not just that he's causing things to come to pass,
he's seated expecting everything to come to pass that he's purposed
according to the counsel of his own will. It's just unfolding
as he's already purposed before time ever began. Every child of God given to Christ
before time will be enlightened by the glorious gospel, come
to the knowledge of the truth because that's his will. That's
his will. Every sin that he died for, every
sinner that he died for on the cross of Calvary, bearing every
sin in his body, he put them all away. That was his will.
He did that. They're gone. There's nothing
left for you and I to do to put away sin. It's gone. Every person
that was in him when he was resurrected, they were resurrected in him
and now have life eternal in him. That was his will. He successfully
redeemed his people. He just lets us know that we've
been justified freely by his grace. We've been washed in his
blood, made whiter than snow. We've been sanctified by his
spirit. We've been bought with a price, made the righteousness
of God in Christ Jesus. That's what this eternal inheritance
is. It's a person, the Lord Jesus
Christ. Because of his will being accomplished,
because God was satisfied to look on him and pardon me, God
is satisfied to look on him to pardon you for his. Because he is seated as a successful
redeemer of his elect, we have an eternal inheritance. Scripture
says it's incorruptible, undefiled, and it fadeth not away. I love
that. Incorruptible, undefiled, and
fadeth not away. Reserved in heaven for you, his
people. Whoever he wrote down as the
benefactors of his will, he loves them, and he redeemed them. all
by his grace, that's the eternal inheritance. Let's pray. Father, we thank you that you
have given us an eternal inheritance, calls us to rest, calls us to
believe. In Christ's name we pray, in Christ's name we pray,
amen. We are going to