“Three Witnesses”
[Hebrews
10:11-18]
May 26, 2013 Second Reformed Church
The author of Hebrews now comes to
the end of the argument he has been making – that Jesus Christ is the fulfillment
of the Old Testament High Priesthood and Sacrifices. And in these verses, he presents three
unimpeachable witnesses to his argument.
“And every priest stands daily at
his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away
sins.”
As we have seen repeatedly, the Old
Testament Sacrificial Law required that sinners offer up animal sacrifices for
their sins – Yom Kippur being the high holy day when all of Israel would gather
to offer up animal sacrifices for their sins, and the high priest would lay the
sins of the people on a goat and send it into the wilderness, and take a second
goat and slaughter it, bringing that blood into the holy of holies, where the
Ark of the Covenant was kept and the presence of God descended, because, as we
keep saying: “Indeed, under the law
almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there
is no forgiveness of sins” (Hebrews 9:22, ESV).
Without the shedding of blood there
is no forgiveness of sins. Period. That is God’s Law. And we saw that God did mercifully receive
the sacrifices of animals and did forgive the sins confessed. However, as the author of Hebrews notes, the
priest stood in his office and daily offered the same sacrifice repeatedly, but
it did not take away sin – all of a person’s sins – and, particularly, the slavery
to sin that all humans are born with due to the sin of our first parents.
So, we saw there are three problems
with trying to see the Sacrificial Law as a way to salvation – which was never
what the Law was intended to be – as we have seen:
First, animals are not an acceptable
substitute for a human. Only a human can
take the place of a human to pay the debt of another human’s sin. But no mere human is eligible to pay the debt
of another human’s sin, because no mere human is holy.
Second,
no mere human could survive paying the debt of another human’s sin, so the
curse of slavery to sin would remain.
And third, multiplying the number of
times a person sacrifices animals does not help the problem, because animals
are still not humans – and multiple animals do not merit a human.
“But
when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down
at the right hand of God,”
The first witness to Jesus
fulfilling the High Priesthood and the Sacrificial System is Jesus
Himself. We have seen in the author of
Hebrews argument – not to mention the Gospels – that Jesus offered Himself in
the role of High Priest and freely gave Himself as the Sacrifice for the sins
of His people – all those who would ever believe.
Although Jesus was not of the line
of Aaron or Levi, but of Judah, Jesus was a better high priest than either line
– Jesus was a high priest after the order of Melchizedek. Jesus was one of a select few to be chosen
directly by God to serve as His High Priest.
Jesus did not inherit His High Priesthood from Joseph, but was given it
by God Himself. And the high priestly
order of Melchizedek was also not one in which the priest lay down his office
when he died, but it was the only one in which the priest held his office
forever. Jesus was appointed by God to
be a High Priest after the order of Melchizedek forever.
Jesus was the One human able to
offer Himself as a sacrifice – not only for one person – but for everyone who
ever believed in Him, because Jesus is a real human being – just like all of
us, but He never sinned – He lived a holy life under God’s Law – so He was
eligible to take on Himself the Wrath of God for the sins of those who believed
in Him. But, He is also God – incarnated
in the Person of Jesus – so, although He died under the Wrath of God, He was
able to rise from the dead. By rising
from the dead, He not only paid the debt for the sins of His people, but He
freed us from our slavery to sin, and imputed to us – credited to us – His
Righteous Life – so we are now seen as righteous in the eyes of God the Father.
Since Jesus is Holy human and Holy
God, it was only necessary that He offer Himself up once as a sacrifice for the
sins of His people. There is never any
need for a sacrifice to be offered again, because the God-Man paid the debt and
raised us to new life.
And when He had finished His Work as
High Priest and Sacrifice, He ascended back to the throne of the Son in the
real Holy of Holies – that is Heaven – the dwelling place of God – and He sat
down on the throne at the right Hand of God, symbolizing that He had completed
His Work and was exercising His Power as Sovereign Ruler of Creation.
Jesus is an unimpeachable witness to
His fulfilling the high priesthood and the Sacrificial System, by rising from
the dead, ascending back to the throne of the Son, and sitting down, resuming
the reign of God over Creation. He
finished His work, and all was completed.
“waiting
from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet.”
The second witness to Jesus
fulfilling the High Priesthood and the Sacrificial System is God, the Father:
God the Father witnesses to Jesus’ fulfillment
of these by receiving the God-Man, God in the Flesh, as being able – authorized
– appropriate – as the One to fill the seat on the throne of the Son. The fact that the Son enters enfleshed the
holy of holies, which is Heaven, was not a disgrace – it did not make Him any
less than God – He was fully God and His physical body – glorified – was
received by the Father to sit next to Him as the Sovereign over all
Creation. There was no repulsion of the
Trinity by bringing a flesh and blood human being, resurrected and glorified,
into their midst, but He was received as the Incarnate God, forever enfleshed
from that moment in the Virgin’s womb forward.
The Father honored the Son by receiving Him Incarnate back to His
throne.
As King of kings, the Son sits on His
throne waiting to receive the promise made to Him that all of His enemies and
all of our enemies, should be made as a footstool for His feet. The imagery comes from the practice of
ancient kings of wearing the feet of the kings they conquered around their
necks. But the enemies that Christ Jesus
has conquered and is bringing under His feet are the fleshly sins, the worldly
sins, hell, death, the devil, and all those who refuse to believe in Jesus
Alone for salvation.
Although Jesus reigns sovereignly
over all things now, He will show His Victory as the Incarnate God on the last
day by stopping these temptations from walking amongst us that entice us to
sin, He will stop the devil from walking among us, death will not be allowed to
claim another person, and all those who refuse to believe will be taken away
and then thrown into the outer darkness to receive the Wrath of God for their
sin. Antichrist(s), heresies,
hypocrites, sin, death, the grave, and Hell, will all be under Jesus’ feet.
As we see in I Corinthians: “ For he
must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to
be destroyed is death. For ‘God has put all things in subjection under his
feet.’ But when it says, ‘all things are put in subjection,’ it is plain that
he is excepted who put all things in subjection under him. When all things are
subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put
all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all”
(1
Corinthians 15:25-28, ESV).
In “the Parable of the Ten Minas,”
Jesus describes bringing all His enemies under His feet like this: “But as for these enemies of mine, who did
not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slaughter them before me” (Luke
19:27, ESV).
Christ’s enemies are our
enemies. And Jesus has put Himself
between His enemies and us to save us.
And the Father has blessed the Work of the Son and kept His Promise and
is now putting all of Christ’s enemies under His feet as a footstool.
The author of Hebrews continues: “For by a single offering he has perfected
for all time those who are being sanctified.”
And this is good news for us because
Jesus has perfected all of His people through His Work. By His One offering – His One Sacrifice of
Himself, functioning as a high priest after the order of Melchizedek, Jesus has
perfected all those who believe in Him forever – all we who are being
sanctified. That is, the One Sacrifice that
Jesus offered to the Father was so perfect, that, as He has made us His people,
we are seen as perfect in Him, and through the Work of God the Holy Spirit in
us, we are being made holy – into the Image of Jesus – day by day.
The fact that we are told that this
perfection is for all time is good news for us, as well – it means that the
Church – that is, all those who believe in Jesus Alone for Salvation – will be
brought into the Kingdom, perfected, holy, and glorified.
The
third witness to Jesus fulfilling the High Priesthood and the Sacrificial
System is God the Holy Spirit:
“And the Holy Spirit also bears
witness to us; for after saying, ‘This is the covenant that I will make with
them after those days, declares the Lord:
I will put my laws on their hearts, and write them on their minds,’ then
he adds, ‘I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.’”
With the witness of the Holy Spirit,
the author of Hebrews argument comes full circle as he quotes the same passage
he quoted back in chapter eight. Here,
though, the author of Hebrews emphasizes that the witness of the Holy Spirit to
the Work of Jesus is for our sake. The
Holy Spirit wants us to know that He is doing these things as a comfort to us
and as an assurance of our salvation in the completed and victorious Work of
Jesus.
The Holy Spirit describes a new
covenant, the Second Covenant – the Gospel, which is unlike the First
Covenant. This Covenant, which God makes
with us unilaterally – God does all the work – there is nothing for us to do
under the Covenant – for us to receive salvation. As Paul reminds us: “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the
great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses,
made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us
up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so
that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in
kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through
faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of
works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ
Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in
them” (Ephesians 2:4-10, ESV).
Since Christ successfully officiated
in His Office of High Priest and offered up Himself as the One Final Sacrifice,
the Second Covenant was cut – God came to earth in the Person of Jesus, lived a
perfect life under God’s Law, took upon Himself all of the sin and all of God’s
Wrath for our sin, died, and physically rose from the dead, ascending back to
His throne – as we have seen.
So
the Holy Spirit takes the Covenant and puts it on our heart and writes it on
our mind. The Holy Spirit causes the
Word of the Gospel to penetrate our hearts that we would believe and remains
with us that we would understand the Gospel with our minds. As Jesus promised: “When
the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will
not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he
will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he
will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine;
therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you” (John
16:13-15, ESV).
And
so we understand that the witness of the Holy Spirit is seen in we who believe,
because only those who have been changed and enlightened by the Holy Spirit can
believe the Gospel.
And,
the Holy Spirit adds, if we have believed the Gospel, then God will not
remember our sins any more. And David
wrote, “The LORD works righteousness and justice for all who are oppressed. He made known his ways to Moses, his acts to
the people of Israel. The LORD is
merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. He will not always chide, nor will he keep
his anger forever. He does not deal with
us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the
earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him; as far as the
east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us. As a father shows compassion to his children,
so the LORD shows compassion to those who fear him. For he knows our frame; he remembers that we
are dust” (Psalm 103:6-14, ESV).
The conclusion of all these things –
of his argument – of the witness of the Holy Trinity is:
“Where there is forgiveness of
these, there is no longer any offering for sin.”
If Jesus has offered Himself Once as
the Perfect and Final Sacrifice as a high priest according to the order of
Melchizedek – if the Gospel is true – there is no need to offer animal
sacrifices, there is no need to re-present or re-offer the Sacrifice of Jesus,
there is no need to offer God any kind of bargain for forgiveness – none of it
works – none of it is effective, except for Jesus Alone.
The author of Hebrews ends this
section on Jesus being the Perfect High Priest and Final Sacrifice by giving
the testimony of three unimpeachable witnesses:
Christ Jesus tells us that since He
is both Perfect Human and Holy God at the same time in One Person, He is able
to merit righteousness for His people and bear the sins and the Wrath of God
for His people. And since He has
physically ascended back to the throne of the Son and is seated at the Right
Hand of God, He signifies that His Work is complete and He is sovereignly
reigning over all of Creation.
So, we ought to understand that
believing the Gospel is our only hope for salvation. And let us also recognize that our bodies and
the material world are good and will be restored at the end of the age.
God the Father tells us that since
He received Christ Jesus in His physical body to sit at His Right Hand that
Christ’s Work is done and acceptable to the Father. And God is keeping His Promise to crush all
of Jesus’ enemies and put them under His feet, as well as to cause all we who
believe in Jesus Alone for salvation to be perfected and made holy.
So, we ought to pray for the end of
Jesus’ enemies and ours – for the antichrist(s), heretics, heresies,
hypocrites, sin, death, the grave – all these things we ought to pray would
come to an end to the Glory of God. And
we ought to strive to keep from sin, ourselves, and pursue the holiness that we
are called to.
God the Holy Spirit tells us that
salvation – putting the Gospel on our hearts and writing it on our mind – is
wholly the work of God; we cannot cause ourselves to believe the Gospel – the
Second Covenant. And God the Holy Spirit
indwells us that He would instruct us and help us to remember what we have read
and heard in the Scripture and of the Gospel.
And God has forgiven all of the sins of everyone who will ever believe
and freed us from our slavery to sin.
So, let us be humble and full of
thanksgiving to God for our salvation.
Let us put aside any idea that we did anything to earn our salvation,
and receive the incredible gift that God has given. Let us read and study our Bibles, and flee
from sin.
And, finally, let us understand what
the author of Hebrews wants us to understand from this section of his
letter: Sin cannot be forgiven without
the shedding of blood. Animal
sacrifices, though instituted by God, we never meant to be a means of salvation
– they couldn’t be – for reasons we have gone over several times. Only God Incarnate, the God-Man, the Savior
that God promised to send, could live, shed His blood and die, and physically
rise that our sin would be forgiven – and we would live eternally with our God
and Savior.
So, let us pray:
Almighty God, we thank You for the
promise and the fulfillment of the promise of salvation through the Savior You
sent. We thank You for giving us the
Scripture to explain why we could not be saved through the blood of animals or
our good works. Help us to believe that
salvation is all of Jesus, only Jesus, and Jesus Alone. And help us to humbly see that salvation is
about Jesus, not us, that we would live for You, and not ourselves. For it is in Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.
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