Pastor Bobby Gilles preached from Hebrews 10:1-18. Because of the once-for-all sacrifice of Christ for our sin, we can experience God’s presence as the Spirit instills a love for God and people within us. Lector: Lindsey Blair
Pastor Bobby Gilles preached from Hebrews 10:1-18. Because of the once-for-all sacrifice of Christ for our sin, we can experience God’s presence as the Spirit instills a love for God and people within us.
Lector: Lindsey Blair
Around the time that God freed an oppressed group of Hebrew slaves in Egypt, someone wrote a prayer in the language of Assyria and Babylon. This was a real person, who experienced the struggles of life much as we do, feeling the depths of human emotions and fighting to make sense of it all. It’s long, with a lot of repetition, but the main part says this:
“Prayer To Any God”
May the god I do not know be reconciled,
May the goddess I do not know be reconciled …
O god, whoever you are, many are my wrongs, great my sins …
I do not know what wrong I have done,
I do not know what sin I have committed,
I do not know what abomination I have perpetrated,
I do not know what taboo I have violated!
Can you feel the heartache, confusion, and desperation?
It’s no wonder people felt this way after the first eleven chapters of Genesis. From the sin in Eden to the Flood to the Tower of Babel and everywhere in between, humanity forsook their identity as image-bearers, created to govern the earth, representing God to creation and reflecting the praises of creation back to God. This was our purpose. Rebellion against our creator left us adrift from a relationship with God, hostile toward each other, and lacking a sense of meaning and purpose, which is why peace and contentment escape us no matter what we achieve.
Even as those who know Jesus, who have been told “Jesus paid it all,” we wonder if we’ve missed something, if our experience of Christianity will ever match the hype. We’re like the Shakespeare character Macbeth: “Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day …” and then he says that life is just, “a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
Earlier in this sermon series Pastor Jonah described the “meat of the gospel” as lives of obedience fueled by experiences of God’s presence. Today’s text reminds us how Jesus made that possible. A way that sometimes even we forget, or that we know intellectually but not as a participatory, experiential relationship that gives meaning to our days.
Jesus made it possible nearly 2000 years ago, but it started 2000 years before that, even before our sad friend from the ancient Near East wrote the “Prayer To Any God.”
In an act of sheer grace God promised a special relationship to a couple named Abraham and Sarah and their descendants. God’s election of this tribe doesn’t ultimately imply the rejection of the rest of us but something that will be for our benefit.
and all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you.” – Genesis 12:3
God gave this one people divine law so they would be a light to the world. And it was a good law. Hear how the psalmist describes it in Psalm 119:
(v.14) I rejoice in following your statutes
as one rejoices in great riches. (45) I will walk about in freedom,
for I have sought out your precepts. (47) for I delight in your commands (111) Your statutes are my heritage forever; they are the joy of my heart. (143) your commands give me delight.
These were “family rules” from a good parent. Wouldn’t it be odd if someone suggested we should remove the fence that separates our playground from Silver Street, so our children would feel less confined?
And remember the goal wasn’t just their flourishing but the whole world. Old Testament professor Carmen Joy Imes described the law like this: “For their society to point others to (God’s) character, they would need to reflect that character in all their relationships.”
Some of these instructions make sense to us. Of course, you shouldn’t murder, or lie, or steal. Some only applied to that ancient Near East culture and geography, like the instruction to build a rail on your roof so no one falls off (Dt 22:8).
These are also minimum standards for a people who did not have the New Covenant – people for whom God had not yet written divine laws on their hearts. The 613 instructions in the law do not express God’s ideals for the eternal kingdom. They are based on his ideals, but contextualized for people who are as sinful as surrounding cultures. They curb the worst abuses of things like slavery and polygamy that were prevalent in the ancient world, but they do not end them.
The law is an early part of the story of God working within culture, condescending to our level to lift us out despite ourselves. It's a minimum standard of behavior for sinful people, but they couldn’t even keep that. And we wouldn’t have, either.
But God, in grace, gave them a sacrificial system to restore their relationship with God when they broke the law. And it centered on animal sacrifice.
Scholar Gordon Wenham says, “Meat was a rare luxury, which was eaten only at festivals or when guests came …. In a poor peasant culture, where animals were your long-term savings, sacrificing them to God was a mark of great generosity, devotion, and penitence. That is why they are frequently said to be a ‘pleasing aroma to the Lord.”
It seems inhumane to kill animals. But we kill proportionally far more animals for meat, with less humane methods of raising, keeping, and slaughtering them, than the law stipulated.
But there were limitations with the sacrificial system. This series has talked a lot about the first one – imperfect priests. We needed a sinless, eternal high priest. Today’s text deals with two other limitations.
those sacrifices are an annual reminder of sins. It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. – Hebrews 10:3-4
The metaphor throughout is of sin (like a stain) being removed via sacrifice (the blood is a purifying agent). Let’s say you have two cleansers. The first one costs a lot and will basically cover stains but will fade and then the stain will return. The other will evaporate the stain, plus any future stains forever. And it’s free. You just have to want it.
Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. – Hebrew 10:11
It’s like a never-ending assembly line. “Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day ….” They can never sit because their job is never done.
The second limitation is not with the law but with the heart of God’s people. Even though the sacrificial system enabled the forgiveness of sins, the prophets called out God’s people for working the system but not living in heartfelt obedience. God said:
“There are those who oppress the innocent and take bribes
and deprive the poor of justice in the courts … I hate, I despise your religious festivals;
your assemblies are a stench to me.
22 Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings,
I will not accept them. – Amos 5:12, 21-22
They needed new hearts with God’s laws upon them. Only then could they become living illustrations of the goal of human life: to be priestly image bearers, governing as God’s vice-regents on earth. Only this way is life more than a tale told by an idiot, signifying nothing.
This New Covenant is something only the willing sacrifice of a sinless high priest, fully human and fully God, could ratify:
Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he said:
“Sacrifice and offering you did not desire,
but a body you prepared for me;
6 with burnt offerings and sin offerings
you were not pleased.
7 Then I said, ‘Here I am—it is written about me in the scroll—
I have come to do your will, my God.’” – Hebrews 10:5-7
We’re overhearing God the Son, speaking to God the Father, teaching us that this had been the plan all along: “it is written about me in the scroll.”
But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, - Hebrews 10:12
Christ sitting down at God’s right hand has been a theme throughout Hebrews, based on Psalm 110:1. Here, it’s saying that Christ’s sacrifice is final. It is finished. It cleanses your sin forever.
The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. First he says:
16 “This is the covenant I will make with them
after that time, says the Lord.
I will put my laws in their hearts,
and I will write them on their minds.”
17 Then he adds:
“Their sins and lawless acts
I will remember no more.” – Hebrews 10:15-17
In the New Covenant, not even God will remember our sin. But God will make us remember his laws, which are placed on our hearts and minds. Anyone ever wondered about this promise? Give your life to Jesus and you’ll have instant recall of 613 instructions? Did that happen for any of you?
Notice the preacher writes that God will put his laws, plural, on our hearts and minds. Hebrews typically uses the singular word “law” to describe the old system with all those rules. The preacher of Hebrews has been referring to the Mosaic covenant and specifically the sacrificial system as God’s law, so the preacher uses the plural word “laws” to talk about the ideals that God has always regarded as the basis for everything else: love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. (Matt 22:37-39)
When we accept the sacrifice of Christ on our behalf, the Spirit gives us a new heart posture, an inner drive to love God and people. How we express that love looks different from person to person. We serve from a posture of confidence in Christ, relying on him for strength but not expecting to match the capacity of those who maybe have more time, better health, or greater resources. We serve out of gratitude, and this increases our joy and sense of purpose.
Those of you who took Women’s School a few weeks ago learned about this. Deacon Lindsey said, “when we give our time and talents to someone else, we experience a surge of joy that can be chemically measured in our brain” (dopamine). She said, “Our bodies were even designed by God to recognize when someone needs our care and to respond. We have literally been created to serve and love others … (participating) in God’s work, to help others experience the transformative and particular love of Jesus, and as that happens, we also grow, we are changed, and we become more like Jesus.”
You can read all her notes in my sermon resources list on the bulletin in our app. I’ve also included a PDF with answers to our typical Bible Fellowship questions about this passage and more info about the law.
But what about when we fail to love God and people?
This is why the New Covenant is such good news. This Covenant is the way the Spirit instills a love for God and people in our hearts and minds. And this same Covenant is the way we are reminded that one sacrifice is all that was needed to forever cleanse us from our failure to love God and love people.
This is how it works: You feel it in your heart when you’re not acting with love toward God and neighbor. You cry out in repentance, where you receive forgiveness, which leads to gratitude, which strengthens your relationship with Christ.
Think back to that ancient prayer that we read at the beginning:
May the god I do not know be reconciled ….
I do not know what wrong I have done,
I do not know what sin I have committed,
Because of Jesus, we aren’t grasping in the dark. We know who we are, whose we are, and where we stand. We know when we’re not living into all God created us to be, but God forgives us every time we ask because of Christ.
As we pour out our hearts in repentance, we experience God’s presence.
As we spend time alone with God, listening for the Spirit’s whisper on a dusty trail or in a cozy den, we experience God’s presence.
As we love our neighbor, we experience and share God’s presence.
As we read, interpret, and apply the Scriptures in community with each other, teaching and admonishing each other to gain wisdom, we experience God’s presence.
My Monday Challenge to you is simple: ask yourself where you see an open door to experiencing God’s presence. Then walk through the door.
Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, little by little, like a mustard seed that grows so gradually that we can only realize what happened in hindsight, when we press into relationship we gradually grow more like Jesus, our great high priest and perfect image of God. And this is the way that God begins to stoke and satisfy the divine desire within us.
Let’s pray.