Have you ever heard about the person who ordered plans for a birdhouse online? Instead of sending the plans for the birdhouse, the company sent plans for a sailboat by mistake. The customer tried to put it together, but it just wouldn’t work. He couldn’t figure out what kind of bird was going to live in this dumb birdhouse. So, he sent the parts back to the company and wrote them an angry email. In response the company emailed the customer. After their apology they added this post script: “If you think it was difficult for you, you should have seen the man who got yourplans trying to sail a birdhouse.”
Sometimes we face problems in life because we don’t understand the purpose of something or even someone we are working with. In our text for today the writer to the Hebrews tells his readers that they have misunderstood the purpose of the law and the sacrifices in the Hebrew Scriptures. They thought they had plans for a birdhouse when what they really had were plans and parts for a sailboat. Let’s see what the writer to the Hebrews has to say about this. Listen for God’s word to you from Hebrews 10:1-18…
Since the law has only a shadow of the good things to come and not the true form of these realities, it[a] can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered year after year, make perfect those who approach. 2 Otherwise, would they not have ceased being offered, since the worshipers, cleansed once for all, would no longer have any consciousness of sin? 3 But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sin year after year. 4 For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. 5 Consequently, when Christ[b] came into the world, he said,
“Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired,
but a body you have prepared for me;
6 in burnt offerings and sin offerings
you have taken no pleasure.
7 Then I said, ‘See, God, I have come to do your will, O God’
(in the scroll of the book[c] it is written of me).”
but a body you have prepared for me;
6 in burnt offerings and sin offerings
you have taken no pleasure.
7 Then I said, ‘See, God, I have come to do your will, O God’
(in the scroll of the book[c] it is written of me).”
8 When he said above, “You have neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings” (these are offered according to the law), 9 then he added, “See, I have come to do your will.” He abolishes the first in order to establish the second. 10 And it is by God’s will[d] that we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
11 And every priest stands day after day at his service, offering again and again the same sacrifices that can never take away sins. 12 But when Christ[e] had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, “he sat down at the right hand of God,” 13 and since then has been waiting “until his enemies would be made a footstool for his feet.” 14 For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified. 15 And the Holy Spirit also testifies to us, for after saying,
16 “This is the covenant that I will make with them
after those days, says the Lord:
I will put my laws in their hearts, and I will write them on their minds,”
after those days, says the Lord:
I will put my laws in their hearts, and I will write them on their minds,”
17 he also adds,
“I will remember[f] their sins and their lawless deeds no more.”
18 Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin.
The Problem with the Sacrifices under the Law
The writer to the Hebrews begins this section of his letter by returning to an idea he voiced in chapter eight, the idea that the law is but a shadow of the good things coming. The word for “shadow”, which is “skia” in Greek, can also mean a silhouette. So, the law, and the sacrifices under the law, gave a silhouette picture of what needed to be done to bring human beings back into union with God. But the law and the sacrifices do not give an “icon” (in Greek)—a clear, detailed portrait of how we are to be united with God.
So, what was the problem with the whole Old Covenant set-up? The writer to the Hebrews says the problem is that these same sacrifices, offered year after year (he is obviously thinking once again of the Day of Atonement) cannot make perfect, or make complete, those who draw near to worship.
Now, the writer to the Hebrews, knows that some of his Jewish readers will object to this. “What do you mean that the Old Covenant sacrifices cannot make us perfect?” So, he goes on to prove his point by asking his readers a question: If these sacrifices could have made a person perfect would they not have stopped being offered? For if the worshippers had been cleansed of their sins by those sacrifices then they wouldn’t feel guilty any longer and so wouldn’t need the sacrifices anymore.
But such was not the case. What the Old Covenant sacrifices actually did was remind people over and over again of their sin.
Let me give you an analogy. Suppose I become ill, and I am so ill that I finally decide to go to the doctor. And suppose the doctor prescribes a certain medicine. And imagine further that I take that medicine. Now, if the medicine works, I will be thrilled. Every time I look at the medicine bottle I will say, “That stuff was great. It helped me get over my illness in no time!” But if the medicine doesn’t work, then every time I look at that bottle it will remind me that I am still sick, and the cure recommended by the doctor didn’t work.
That’s basically what the writer to the Hebrews tells us. He says, “it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.” Rather, these sacrifices are just a reminder of our basic human illness—a reminder that we need another cure—albeit a cure that fits the silhouette picture of the law and the sacrifices.
So, in verse five the writer to the Hebrews introduces us, once again, to the person who fills in the silhouette picture of the Old Covenant sacrifices, the one who is the icon, the detailed portrait of how we are to be made write with God.
The answer to the problem of the Old Covenant sacrifices is Christ.
When Christ came into the world, what did he say? The writer to the Hebrews puts on the lips of Jesus these words of Psalm 40:6-8,
Sacrifice and offering you do not desire,
but you have given me an open ear.[a]
Burnt offering and sin offering
you have not required.
7 Then I said, “Here I am;
in the scroll of the book it is written of me.[b]
8 I delight to do your will, O my God;
your law is within my heart.”
but you have given me an open ear.[a]
Burnt offering and sin offering
you have not required.
7 Then I said, “Here I am;
in the scroll of the book it is written of me.[b]
8 I delight to do your will, O my God;
your law is within my heart.”
This is very ingenious—for the writer to the Hebrews to see these verses as the life message of the Messiah. What our author is saying is that the voluntary offering of a human being, coming to do the will of God, is the bright reality of which the law and Old Covenant sacrifices were merely a shadow.
Furthermore, Psalm 40 is not the only passage in the Hebrew Scriptures that suggests this. It is hinted at in 1 Samuel 15:22, Isaiah 1:10-17, and Hosea 6:6. The Hebrew Scriptures point forward to something better than its own sacrifices.
That something better is the voluntary, obedient self-offering of the better priest—Jesus Christ. He is the one who has come to do God’s will; he is the one who has God’s law within his heart.
You may have noticed that the way the writer to the Hebrews quotes Psalm 40 is slightly different than what I read from Psalm 40 itself. That is because what we have in our Bibles in Psalm 40 is based upon the Hebrew text, whereas the writer to the Hebrews quotes from the Septuagint or Greek version of the Hebrew Scriptures. The quote from the Septuagint reads, “but a body you prepared for me” whereas the Hebrew reads “but my ears you have pierced.”
These two versions really mean the same thing in the end, but the practice behind the Hebrew version of Psalm 40 is interesting. Under the Hebrew law, when a slave was set free, that slave could voluntarily choose to remain a slave of his or her master out of love for that master. And if the slave chose to do that then he or she would have their ears pierced as a sign of their voluntary surrender.
Jesus voluntarily surrendered to his Father in heaven as his master and he did it out of love. The way he did that was by offering his body for his master’s service, even to the point of sacrificing that body on the cross where it was pierced with a sword. This, the writer to the Hebrews explains, is how Jesus’ sacrifice has come to replace the sacrifices of the Old Covenant.
Now, many people in the world today do their work sitting down. I know I do much of my work that way. Though I stand to preach and teach, I sit to write, and that writing takes up a good part of my week. So, when I am finished working, I like to get up and go for a walk.
Such was not the case in the ancient world, and maybe not in your world either. In the ancient world, most people stood for their work. Farmers stood; builders stood, even fishermen would stand to do much of their work. And so when they were finished with their work they were very tired and thus were glad to sit down and rest, whereas most of us today when we are finished with our work, actually need to go out and get some exercise.
It’s important to get the right picture of the ancient world in our minds in order to fully appreciate what the writer to the Hebrews says in this passage. The third point that he drives home here is that the priests of the Old Covenant continue to stand, offering sacrifices day after day that can never take sins away.
By contrast, after Jesus offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God.
Do you get it? Jesus sat down. That means his work, namely his work of offering a perfect sacrifice for sin, is complete. Nothing more needs to be added to it. Now the only thing he is waiting for, says the writer to the Hebrews, is for his enemies to be made his footstool (a reference to Psalm 110).
I don’t know whether I have ever told you about my former dentist in Virginia. Almost every time I was in his chair, he would try to tell me about his religious beliefs. He was not a Christian but rather a proponent of what has been called New Age belief. One day, the main point my dentist was trying to get across to me was that life is an illusion and that we have to rise to a higher level of consciousness to connect with God.
I told him the pain I was feeling in my mouth while he was working on me was not an illusion! I’m not sure whether he appreciated the comment or not.
Amazingly, I was able to get a few other comments in, that is, when my mouth wasn’t full of dental instruments. I was rather a captive audience. But so was he!
One of the things I said to my dentist was basically this: I said the difference between Christianity and all other religions, including the New Age movement, is that other religions all say, “Do!” In other religions you have to do this or do that in order to get re-connected with God. By contrast, Christianity says, “Done!” Jesus did for us what we could not do for ourselves. He lived a perfect life and he applied the perfect record of his life to our spiritual bank account. Then he died on a cross in our place to pay the penalty for our sin. While all other religions are saying, “Do,” Jesus says, “Done!”
I don’t remember what my dentist’s response was to this, but you may be wondering, “So what is the Christian life all about?” Do we just sit around and do nothing until Jesus takes us to heaven?
Not exactly.
In verse fourteen, the writer to the Hebrews draws yet another wonderful contrast. He says that by one sacrifice Christ has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.
Christ made us perfect by his one sacrifice, once for all. His work is complete. But our work is ongoing. We are still being made holy. How can this be? And which is it? Are we already made perfect? Or are we still in the process of being made holy?
The answer is: both. From God’s perspective in eternity we are already perfect, we are already complete in Christ; we have already reached the goal for which he created us and redeemed us. That is true because God is outside of time. Time itself is part of his creation. So, he already sees the end from the beginning. He already sees us as we will be on that day when he brings history to a consummation and he establishes his eternal kingdom on a renewed earth.
But from our perspective we are still being made holy by the work of the Holy Spirit in us, applying to our lives the work accomplished by Christ once for all on the cross. Becoming holy is for us, in time, a process. But God, outside of time, already sees that process complete.
Christianity is not a religion that moves in a circle, with Jesus having to die over and over again. No, Christianity is a movement in a straight line. It is a story with a beginning, a middle and a climax. Of course, there may be many new stories that will have their beginning in eternity. The beginning of the story here on earth is all about God’s perfect creation that we as human beings have sabotaged. The middle of the story is all about God’s rescue of creation, including us, through Christ. And the end of history will be all about making Christ’s enemies a footstool for his feet. In other words, all that is now wrong with the universe will be put to right in the end. The point is that we are moving toward God’s appointed future because of what Jesus accomplished in the middle of history.
And what is happening in the mean time? The writer to the Hebrews answers that question by quoting from Jeremiah 31, which he has had in the back of his mind ever since chapter 8. What God is about in the meantime, in between Christ’s once for all act in the middle of history, and the consummation at the end of history, is that he is making each one of us into little copies of Christ. The law which was in Christ’s heart, God is putting into our hearts. He is doing this by putting Christ into each one of us by the Holy Spirit. And the result of Christ’s work in us is glorious: “Their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more,” says Jeremiah. And since our sins have been forgiven, then the writer to the Hebrews concludes: there is no longer any need for the animal sacrifices of the Old Covenant.
Let me close with this from Joshua Harris’ book, Dug Down Deep…
Most of us find peace over past sins by trying to forget and move on. We find comfort in the distance that comes with the passing of time. The further we are from our sins, the less we feel they mark our lives and the less guilty we feel… Do I even remember half of the wrongs I’ve done? The truth is that I’ve conveniently forgotten most of my violations.
I read a newspaper story about a woman named Jill Price who has a rare condition doctors call “superior autobiographical memory.” Jill can recall in vivid detail every day of her life since age fourteen. Experts at the University of California studied her for six years to confirm her ability. If you’ve ever wished you had a better memory, you might want to reconsider. Jill views it as a blessing and a curse. She has warm memories that comfort her at difficult times, but there’s also a dark side. She recalls every bad decision, every insult, and every excruciating embarrassment. Over the years, Jill said, the memories have eaten her up. She feels paralyzed and assaulted by them. Peaceful sleep is rare.
We all want to think of ourselves as basically good people. But we can believe that illusion only because we forget most of our past decisions and actions and thoughts. But what if we remembered them perfectly?
The wonderful truth of the passage we have read today is that though God has total recall of every sin we have ever committed, he chooses not to remember those sins against us because of what his Son Jesus has done for us on the cross. Jesus did for us what no former sacrifice or priest could ever do: he has wiped out our bad record and given us holiness in its place.
It makes me want to say with the Apostle Paul: “Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!” (2 Corinthians 9:15)
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