Jesus our final sacrifice
Hebrews 9:11-15(MSG) But when the Messiah arrived, high priest of the superior things of this new covenant, he bypassed the old tent and its trappings in this created world and went straight into heaven’s “tent”—the true Holy Place—once and for all. He also bypassed the sacrifices consisting of goat and calf blood, instead using his own blood as the price to set us free once and for all. If that animal blood and the other rituals of purification were effective in cleaning up certain matters of our religion and behavior, think how much more the blood of Christ cleans up our whole lives, inside and out. Through the Spirit, Christ offered himself as an unblemished sacrifice, freeing us from all those dead-end efforts to make ourselves respectable, so that we can live all out for God.
Hebrews 9:27-28(MSG) Everyone has to die once, then face the consequences. Christ’s death was also a one-time event, but it was a sacrifice that took care of sins forever. And so, when he next appears, the outcome for those eager to greet him is, precisely, salvation.
In Hebrews 9, it’s explained how the old rituals and ceremonies of the Levitical priesthood couldn’t permanently remove sin. They were temporary and insufficient. However, Christ’s work as the High Priest was different. His sacrifice was powerful enough to cleanse sins completely and didn’t need to be repeated. Jesus now acts as our High Priest and Mediator before God, interceding on our behalf.
The concept of a superior sacrifice is emphasised, with Christ’s death being described as effective in cleansing the conscience and providing full forgiveness for sins, thus eliminating the need for repeated sacrifices.
Once a year the high priest carried the blood of sacrifices into the Most Holy Place of the Jerusalem Temple. The fact that the high priest could only approach God once a year, demonstrated limited access to God.
Jesus changed all of this. Jesus brought eternal redemption, including permanent forgiveness. Jesus’s death was permanently effective. It required no repetition. The single offering of His life removed the sins of all who accepted Him. Jesus gives us permanent forgiveness and cleanses us.
Christ is in heaven interceding on our behalf. He is in the heaven, He is in the presence of God, He is face-to-face with God as our priestly representative. The fact that Christ is in heaven, indicates that the sacrifice for sin has been accepted, and our sin has been put away once for all, forever.
I conclude with Acts 4:11-12(NLT) For Jesus is the one referred to in the Scriptures, where it says, ‘The stone that you builders rejected has now become the cornerstone.’ There is salvation in no one else! God has given no other name under heaven by which we must be saved.”