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will oh God above when he said sacrifice and offering and and burnt offerings and offering for sin thou wouldst not neither hats pleasure therein which are offered by the law then said he lo I come to do thy will oh God he take the way the first that he may establish the second by the which will we are sank sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all and every priest and a daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices which can never take away sins but this man after yet offered one sacrifice for sins forever sat down on the right hand of God from henceforth expecting to his enemies be made his footstool for by one offering he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified where of the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us for after that he had said before this is the covenant that I will make with them after those days saith the Lord I will put my laws into their hearts and in their minds will I write them and their sins and inequities will I remember no more now where remission of these is there is no more offering for sin having therefore brethren boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus by a new and living way which he hath consecrated for us through the veil that is to say his flesh and having a high priest over the house of God let us draw near with a true heart and full assurance of faith having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering for he is faithful that promised and let us consider one another to provoke unto love into good works not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as a manner of some is but exhorting one another and so much the more as you see the day approaching for if we sin willfully after that we are received the knowledge of the truth there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation we shall devour the adversaries he that despised Moses law died without mercy under two or three witnesses of how much sore punishment suppose ye shall he be thought worthy who I trodden underfoot the Son of God and that counted the blood of the Covenant wherewith he was sanctified and unholy thing and hath done despite unto the spirit of grace for we know him that hath said vengeance belongeth unto me I will recompense say the Lord and again the Lord shall judge his people it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the Living God the call to remembrance the former days in which after you were illuminated you endured a great fight of afflictions partly whilst you were made a gazing stock both by reproaches and afflictions and partly whilst he became companions of them that were so used for yet compassion of me and my bonds and took joyfully the spoiling of your goods knowing in yourselves that you have in heaven a better and an enduring substance cast not away therefore your confidence which hath great recompense of reward for you have need of patience that after you had done the will of God you might receive the promise for yet a little while and he that shall come will come and will not tarry now the judge shall live by faith but if any man draw back my soul shall have no pleasure in him but we are not of them who draw back on the perdition but of them that believe to the saving of the soul spray thank you Heavenly Father for the King James Bible dear God we thank you for this wonderful church you have given us dear God and we thank you for our pastor please bless him this evening as he preaches your word in Jesus name we pray amen amen okay we're in the book of Hebrews tonight we're continuing our series our Bible study on the book of Hebrews and tonight the subject of tonight's sermon is no more sacrifice for sins no more sacrifice for sins now Hebrews chapter 10 is a special chapter in the sense that it's often the chapter that people who believe you can lose your salvation will try to use misconstrue and misinterpret to teach that somehow if you continue in willful sin that basically because there remain is no more sacrifice for sins you're gonna lose your salvation and this along with Hebrews chapter 6 is often used to teach a workspace salvation but obviously we know that Hebrew 6 is not teaching a workspace salvation because a workspace salvation is never taught in the Bible but also because of the fact that it's just referring to apostasy a person who was never saved to begin with now we can see why people would get this confused someone who is not knowledgeable of the Bible they're not necessarily they don't have their senses exercised to discern good and evil they don't really they're not really skillful in the word of righteousness we can see how they can get confused by people if they were to use this particular chapter to teach that and it's because of verse 26 if you look at verse 26 it says for if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins and at face value if you have no previous knowledge of the Bible you don't really know a whole lot about doctrine and what the context is you know you can be deceived into thinking that this is saying basically that you're not gonna get your sins forgiven because you are involved in willful sinning now let me just start off by saying that pretty much everyone commits willful sin because it requires sin requires your will to do it right it's not you accidentally sin everyone who sins does it willfully because they live in this body and therefore they are the ones who are partaking it they made a decision to do so but I'll get into the interpretation of that verse in just a little bit but let's go ahead and get into the first part of the chapter and this is talking about the inferiority of the animal sacrifices so so far we have seen over the last couple of chapters that the Apostle Paul is addressing the fact that everything in the Old Testament every system every leader every high priest though they carried out their job essentially at the end of the day were inferior representations of the true referring to Jesus Christ and the New Testament and the animal sacrifices is no exception to that rule okay and what I'm saying is that the animal sacrifices of the Old Covenant though done frequently and though done according to God's stipulations were at the end of the day still inferior to the sacrifice of Jesus Christ now look at verse number one it says here for the law having a shadow of good things to come and not the very image of the things so that's the first thing I want you to notice it says that it's a shadow but it's not the very image implying that it is representing something else now who is the image that this is referring to if we're talking about the sacrifices well Jesus is the image right so those sacrifices though necessary during that time they were not the very image of the sacrifice of Jesus right they were used to symbolically represent what Christ will do for us in the first century when he came physically to this earth it says for the law having a good a shadow of good things to come not the very image of the things listen to this can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers there unto perfect now that's a very important phrase there right because you have dispensational it's the will say well they were saved by the animal sacrifices in the Old Testament well then you are either lying or you're just not reading Hebrews 10 1 because it says here that the sacrifices that were made these offerings that were made they can never make the person who's offering them perfect in other words they can't save you okay now here's the thing is that the people in the Old Testament knew that it's just the dispensationalist don't know that okay but the people who actually participated in these religious rights of the Old Testament they understood that that wasn't they couldn't make them perfect they couldn't save them they were foreshadowing something else look at verse 2 for them well they had not ceased to be offered because that worshippers once purged should have no more conscience of sins so he's kind of using some common sense here and he's saying look if the animal side of sacrifices had the capability of just making you perfect saving you forgiving you of all sins then answer me this why were they being offered every single day every single year if they're so effective in atoning for the totality of sins then only one sacrifice should have been made but obviously they're ineffective which is why they continuously had to do it year by year and in fact day by day and he's saying here if they could there should be no more offerings the first animal that was sacrificed in the Old Testament should have been sufficient done for that's enough because they would have no more conscience of sins the Bible says however that's not the case and obviously the people knew that look at verse 3 but in those sacrifices there was a remembrance again made of sins every year verse 4 for it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins now if you've read the Bible for any length of time you may think to yourself well that seems a little contradictory because I've read the Old Testament and I've read the book of Leviticus a couple times and I've noticed that the animal sacrifices were made to atone for the sins of the people so how do we fit what it says in Leviticus regarding the sacrifices of the animals for the atonement of sins when it says here in Hebrew chapter 10 verse 4 that it's impossible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins well here's the answer is that the reason these animal sacrifices were done on a daily basis was to atone for daily sins however they could never listen to this take away sins what does that mean they could never really deal with the problem of sin in its entirety understand so if someone made an offense against the brother that made an offense against God for that day they could bring an animal sacrifice to atone for that specific sin of today or excuse me of that day and it would atone for that but then tomorrow if that same sin was committed they would have to offer another sacrifice now how do we relate that to today us as Christians in the New Testament well here's the thing as safe people we know beyond a shadow of a doubt that we've been forgiven of all of our sins but does that mean we don't sin every single day no we sin every single day and here's the thing is that as Christians when we sin the Bible commands us to do what to confess our sins and in fact first John 1 9 tells us that if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness now notice that it says that he is what faithful now why does it say that he's faithful because he knows that we're gonna do it again so he consistently forgives us because we consistently sin the Bible tells us that there's not a just man upon earth to do with good and sin it's not now the difference between Old Covenant animal sacrifices and the atoning of daily sins and the atoning of today sin is that we already have this this sacrifice that has been done where all we have to we can skip and bypass doing the animal sacrifice and just go to Jesus personally understand and one of the reasons why is because of the fact that the Bible says that he is the propitiation for our sins not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world and we've been made righteous through the blood of Jesus Christ so a good way to represent this is that when we sin God looks upon us not through our unrighteous works not through our you know own righteousness or whatever maybe he sees us through the righteousness of Jesus Christ so the blood of Jesus is this perpetual atoning for us that just never ends however we have to make sure on the day-to-day basis that we're confessing our sins daily because we sin every single day so we have to be cleansed by the confession of sins but also by the washing of the water by the word right the Bible tells us that we're sanctified through the Word of God and if you've walked with God for any length of time you know that's true that when you read the Bible you're kind of getting right with God as you're reading the Bible right you're reading the Word of God and you're just like man you know and you read something and you get right in your heart and you know when the Spirit of God is resonating with your spirit and you're reading the Bible and you're being fed you're being sanctified through the Word of God right that's what it's referring to and so people did animal sacrifices in the Old Testament even if they were saved to atone for their daily sins in the New Testament today we don't do animal sacrifices for that we just confess our sins on a daily basis we get washed by the water of the word we get sanctified through the Holy Spirit that's what it's referring to but what the point that the passage is making here is that the animals were so inferior in this particular job that they can never take away the totality of sins whereas when Jesus Christ was crucified on the cross he paid for sins past present and future now here's what's funny about this okay you know you have these workspace salvationists and obviously they're not going to deny that Jesus died on the cross to pay for our sins they're not gonna deny because if they did you know they just sound heretical times 10 right now they're heretical times 5 but they would sound heretical times 10 if they made that statement right and it's all over the Bible that Jesus blood pays for our sins but what they'll try to have this little loophole though to say well he paid for our sins but he paid only for our past sins though okay so whatever willful sin you do in the future he didn't pay for that you know because if we continue and will for sin there remain no more sacrifice for sins so therefore you know he's only atoned for our previous sins prior to salvation but after that you're kind of like on your own okay you got to live a righteous life or whatever but think about how stupid this is okay because all of our sins in this building or should I say all of our past sins in this building are all future sins respective to when Jesus Christ died on the cross like air doesn't matter how old you are okay let's just take a person who died a hundred years ago even that saved person's past sins is still future respective to when Jesus Christ died on the cross not only that it's silly for another reason and that is that a person who claims that when you get saved you only get forgiven of past sins they're essentially saying that God is not omniscient because what they're claiming is that well when Jesus Christ died on the cross you're forgiven of past sins but you know he can't take care of whatever happens in the future implying that if he doesn't know what sins they're gonna commit in the future folks God knows every single bad decision you're gonna make tomorrow he knows every single sin that you're gonna do tomorrow and the day after and for the rest of your life it's called the omniscience of God so he saved you knowing what stupid thing you're gonna do this week and you know I find comfort in that you know I find comfort in knowing that my God knows everything he knows me better than I know myself and I find comfort in the fact that when I got saved at the age of 21 when I believed on the Lord Jesus Christ he saved me knowing what sins I was gonna commit in the future and he saved me anyways right but no these people are like no it's only past sins that he forgives you for but it's such a illogical statement to make and it doesn't match up with the Bible and essentially they're implying that God's atonement is limited because it's only limited to your past sins no when the Bible tells us that God forgives us it's literally for all sins from the beginning of time the beginning of your life to the end of your life he atones for it all now let's let's veer off of chapter 10 for just a little bit go to Romans chapter 4 because it's always good to revisit this particular doctrine just to make sure we all understand the the doctrine of atonement the doctrine of imputation of righteousness and what we're forgiven of look at Romans chapter 4 verse number 3 and I like this first statement in verse number 3 for what sayeth the scripture too many people are given their opinions nowadays and they want to take these logical leaps of what you know what doctrine says and all these things you know what we need to do just let's say it the Bible let's say it the scripture yeah I get that you're taking this logical leap these mental gymnastics to say that we're only forgiven of past sins and all these things but you know what why don't we just go to what the Bible says but I've noticed that the people we say that to often don't care what the Bible says they don't the Bible is not their authority but it is our authority it says for what sayeth the scripture Abraham believed God and it was counted unto him for righteousness now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace but of debt but to him that worketh not but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly his faith is counted for righteousness so that's a good verse to people who claim that you have to do works to be saved or that works accompany salvation here it says that if you don't even do works you're still saved your faith is still counted for righteousness because the Bible says not by works of righteousness which we have done the Bible says for my grace are you saved through faith in that not of yourselves that is the gift of God not of works lest any man should boast so there's a wonderful verse here he still justifies you even if you are absent of works okay it says in verse 6 even as David also described it the blessedness of the man unto him God imputed righteousness without work so now we're gonna look at David's understanding of salvation inspired by the Holy Spirit in its context of course he's still talking about believing on the Lord to be saved and David is describing parts of the blessings of salvation because we can think of all types of facets of justification that we would say man that's a blessing it's a blessing to be a child of God because I'm saved right it's a blessing that I'm gonna live forever because I'm saved blessing I'm gonna see the new heaven the new earth because I'm saved so we're blessed because of that but David in this particular passage is focusing on a particular aspect and that is the aspect of forgiveness so he says the blessed is the man unto him God imputed righteousness without works in other words a person who's saved and then he goes on to say explain what are the sins that are forgiven he says in verse 7 saying blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven forgiven is a past tense phrase right there right referring to the fact that whatever you did in the past those sins are covered by the blood of Jesus Christ oh but wait there's more and whose sins are covered are covered are whatever currently you're doing at this moment that's atoned for by the blood of Jesus Christ but wait there's more blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin in other words he's not gonna hold you accountable eternally for the sins you commit in the future because will not impute sin means it's a future tense that's talking that's being stated there okay now this is all in context of salvation and David is explaining why it's such a blessing to be saved because it's not like well God forgives you of the small sins but the big ones though that's on you you know this limited type of atonement philosophy and doctrine that limits the grace of God it limits his forgiving power and essentially it's just really dumb because it's given us the past present and future tenses here of the forgiveness that we that we receive not only that but you know in the context of Hebrews chapter 10 he literally says that your iniquities and sins will I remember no more so he's like I'm not gonna remember and he didn't say your past sins and your past iniquities I will remember no more he just says your sins and your iniquities I will remember no more now why does he say that well because God is speaking from the place of eternity he's outside of time so he views your life as though it already happened right he sees the beginning and he sees the end it's not like he's like obviously God and that we can't explain it perfectly because of the fact that we are finite beings and we're stuck in this realm called time but you know although God walks with us and we walk with God in our day-to-day lives at the end of the day he's outside of the spectrum of time and you can view every he has a panoramic view of your life so he looks at all the sins you commit throughout your life and he forgives you of all of them it's not like you catch God off guard because you committed X Y and Z sin or something it's like oh man I didn't think you were gonna do that Wow you surprised me no one catches God off guard okay go to Micah chapter 7 if you would Micah chapter 7 I'm gonna reach you from Psalm 103 verse 10 one of the most beautiful passages in the Bible dealing with the forgiveness of sin is in Psalm 103 verse 10 you could write it down read it later I'm gonna reach you right now it says he hath not dealt with us after our sins nor rewarded us according to our iniquities amen for as the heaven is high above the earth so great is his mercy toward them that fear him as far as the east is from the west so far hath he removed our transgressions from us the Bible says notice it doesn't say past transgressions it just says transgressions and by the way East and West never meet so he's saying as far as these is from the West that's how far he's removed them in other words they will never be brought up ever again because the blood of Jesus Christ separates your transgressions from you as far as his East is from West well I'm not convinced I still think it's just past sins okay you know I think if you continue with willful sin later on you're not gonna be forgiven of those things well look at Micah 7 19 Micah 7 19 says he will turn again he will have compassion upon us he will subdue our iniquities and thou will cast some of their sins some of their past sins all of their sins in the depths of the sea so he's like he's gonna cast them he's gonna throw them all in the depths of the sea and you can't infer oh that just means past sins no it says all sins God didn't make a mistake when he wrote the Bible okay and it's not like oh man he forgot to put the past or something no all really means all amen and so what is the teaching that we see go back to Hebrew chapter 10 the teaching that we see here is that the animal sacrifices were inferior because it's something that just continuously have to take place to atone for daily sin whereas in the New Testament now that we believed on the Lord we received a totality forgiveness of all of our sins but we also are able to go to God and confess our sins at whatever destined or whatever geographical location we're in we don't have to go to a tabernacle we don't have to bring a heifer we don't have to bring a goat or a bowl of any animal any of any type to atone for that daily sin we literally offer ourselves unto the Lord and say Lord forgive me because I sin in this area and I'm in a complete agreement with you that I've sinned please forgive me and you can move on with your life right or you can read your Bible every single day and be sanctified by the Word of God this is why the New Testament is superior okay you don't have to go to Israel and go to some desert and try to atone for your sins no it just requires you're can the confession of your mouth the word is neither even in thy mouth okay you can call upon the name of the Lord anywhere at any time to get right with God you don't have you don't even have to be in church for that you don't have to be in church you don't have to be a particular listening to a particular preacher you can literally do it in the confines of your own home and just get right with God right then and right there you say well you know I'm just not really good at praying well here's the thing is that can you talk you know I mean like are you able to speak have you ever had a conversation with the person that's exactly what you do with the Lord okay you know you don't have to memorize some vain repetition like the Catholics do and repeat that seven times over you know and do it or not even so I mean who's a former Catholic who knows how many well how many times 10 Hail Mary's for the rosary for each beat did you do 10 I mean that's crazy so you have to memorize that and pray that everything folks the Bible tells us not to use vain repetition and the Bible consistently talks about talks to us regarding that that when we pray unto the Lord there's a certain model that we should use but it's not you know a list of verses that we need to memorize in order to pray that unto the Lord we speak to God from our reigns okay from the inner man unto the Lord that's exactly how you do it so when you're when you're praying you know unto the Lord to confess your sins or for whatever reason you just talk to him you know the way you would talk to anybody obviously making sure that you hold reverence and respect and recognize he's a holy God but you speak unto the Lord from the heart that's how it is okay look at verse 5 it says wherefore when he cometh into the world he saved sacrifice and offering that would it's not but a body has thou prepared me and burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou has had no pleasure then said I lo I come in the volume of the book it is written of me to do thy will Oh God above when he said sacrifice and offering and burnt offerings and offering for sin that would it's not neither hats pleasure therein which are offered by the law then said he lo I come to do thy will Oh God he taketh away the first they may establish a second so first we see the inferiority of the animal sacrifices the next thing we're gonna look at is that Jesus soul was offered okay so when we look at the sacrifice of Jesus Christ and we compare it to Old Testament sacrifices we see that they actually have a lot of similarities right we obviously know that the Bible tells us that Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God who should take away the sins of the world and this passage is telling us them at the end of the day even though God instituted for those animal sacrifices to be made I think that they God had no pleasure in those animals why because they're livestock they're animals and they can't really do much understand and so he wasn't necessarily pleased with them but you know there's one sacrifice that he is pleased with and that is the sacrifice of his son which is why he sent them to this earth this is my beloved son and whom I am well pleased and he came here to sacrifice himself now here's the thing is that you know a lot of people have a problem with what I'm about to say but people just need to just believe the Bible and stop being so soft about these things and that is that when the animal sacrifices were done in the Old Testament no one's gonna deny that they were burned I mean that's what an offering is okay now when you look at how animals were killed in those days and how they were treated and what what is the took place we can see a lot of parallels with Jesus Christ for example they would fasten the animal to an altar and Jesus Christ was fastened with nails to a cross right not only that but the animal was also burned okay that's literally and in fact in Spanish it's a la costo which is Holocaust he was made a Holocaust well in like manner the Bible tells us that when Jesus Christ died he descended to hell for three days and three nights now if you're reading one of these new versions of the Bible you're gonna have a hard time believing that because the new versions always mess it up okay whereas the Bible literally says regarding Jesus Christ in Acts chapter 2 that his soul was not left in hell neither that his flesh see corruption so the Bible is literally telling us that the soul of Jesus Christ when he died descended into hell now you say well you know that's an axe well but here's the thing though the Bible also says Jesus said that as Jonas was three days and three nights in the wells belly so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth and if you were to compare that to when that took place in the book of Jonah chapter 2 you see that Jonah is prophetically talking about Jesus Christ and he mentions going to hell here's the difference Jonah didn't go to hell Jonah went inside of Wells belly okay but he's prophetically referring to Jesus Christ who will and has obviously gone to hell okay and this is something that can be proven consistently throughout the Word of God you know Ephesians chapter 4 states what is it that he ascended but that he first descended into the lower parts of the earth okay and you know people will say well you know but that's talking about Abraham's bosom okay and they'll often use Luke chapter 16 as a proof text to say that you know there's this second compartment of hell known as Abraham's bosom and there's a great gulf fixed between Abraham's bosom which is where the saint the souls of the saints of the Old Testament were they would go there and basically when Jesus died he went to that same place and he preached to them and then he brought him up and he took him to heaven thereafter but it's that's such a silly interpretation and it's stretching the truth quite a bit because Abraham's bosom did exist but it's in the chest cavity of a person that's named Abraham okay and so there is no second compartment now there might be a second compartment of hell but it's still hell you know I mean like the the core of the earth is big enough that you can make a prior ton of compartments and it's probably a compartment for people who are just really wicked and false prophets but why don't we use the biblical term and just call it a lower hell right a greater damnation as the Bible puts it okay but there is no place there's not like a hotel up you know across from hell we're like the saints of the Old Testament we're just chilling out and it's just humid there and it's just they're just awaiting it just it's so nonsensical and here's the thing the only way you can make that fit is if you believe in dispensational salvation but you have a bunch of people who don't believe in dispensational salvation who believe the salvation was correct I mean it was the same all the way through but yet still hold to the doctrine of Abraham's bosom well then at that point what's the point of Abraham's bosom because the point of Abraham's bosom from the dispensational perspective is that because there's different Gospels Jesus had to descend into Abraham's bosom to preach to them under the New Testament covenant so that they can basically believe on him and then it can come up I mean it's crazy but if someone doesn't believe in dispensational salvation what's even the point of Abraham's bosom it's no point at all you know and they'll make this argument like yeah no one in the Old Testament was in heaven it's just like what about Elijah okay maybe Elijah what about Enoch okay maybe Enoch well how about maybe everyone who was saved was it in heaven because there's examples in the Bible of people going to heaven and in fact in Job chapter 1 the Bible talks about the sons of God presenting themselves before the Lord so there's saved people in heaven presenting themselves before God to worship him to sing praises unto him what are they doing there hey you guys got the wrong compartment you guys took a wrong turn you know you guys aren't supposed to be in here is that a VIP section or something no it's just that everyone went to heaven who was saved in the Old Testament okay and it's just crazy to think that you know when the Bible says in the beginning God created the heaven and the earth the heavens referring to the place where God dwells right we obviously know that God is eternal but the reason he created this this this place called heaven was to house the spirits of the redeemed but somehow were to think that from the time that Genesis 1 happened the creation period where he created heaven all the way up until the New Testament just empty the entire time you know what I mean it's nonsense obviously he built it because of the fact that soon thereafter Abel would be there and you know that what that would doubt I always think that that's just weird you know Abel pops up and he's just like you know where's everyone it's just like you're the first one dude he's just kind of waiting for people to die and stuff and it's just like oh that person died he's like yeah but they weren't saved you know like oh that sucks he's got no one to play with you know I mean until like someone else dies or whatever but the point that I'm making is that Jesus Christ did die and go to hell he was made an offering you know we can readily agree with old IFP or whatever that Jesus the the the animal being fastened to the altar pictures Jesus Christ being fastened but all of a sudden when it comes when it comes to the burning of the sacrifice they just want to ignore that let me reach you from Isaiah 53 verse 10 yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him this is one of the most famous prophetic passages about Jesus Christ he has put him to grief when thou shall make his soul an offering for sin because his soul descended okay and so we see that these Old Testament sacrifices the way they were handled what was done into them they represented what Jesus Christ would do the fact he's fastened to an altar the fact that the sins of the people were laid upon the animal right they would put the sins of the people on the animal to be sacrificed well the Bible says that when Jesus Christ was crucified he himself bore our sins on his own body on the tree okay he had made him to be sin who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him now you know why is it so hard to believe that he descended into hell when that's exactly what happened to you had you not been saved okay and then lastly of course once the animal sacrifice once it was burned you know what would they do they would eat it the priest would participate along with the person who brought the sacrifice to eat the sacrifice I mean that was part of the inheritance of the Levites was that they were supposed to participate in the consumption of the actual sacrifice itself and by the way the Bible says in John chapter 6 verse 54 Jesus saying this who so eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life and I will raise him up in the last day referring to the fact that when the priest and the person who brought the sacrifice would eat of the sacrifice they were picturing salvation as well because we're eating of you know the eating of his flesh and drinking drinking of his blood is the equivalent spiritually to believing on Jesus Christ you understand because we were participant we are consuming the fact that Jesus Christ sacrificed himself for us and that he shed his blood for the remissions of our sins this isn't teaching you know transubstantiation this teaching that if like you take a Eucharist that once you you know eat the unleavened bread and it gets in your stomach it turns into the blood it turns into the body of Jesus Christ or something there's just this spiritual cannibalism that the Catholic Church teaches it's weird you know and people are in the Catholic Church don't seem to realize that's a weird that's weird dude dude that's weird so you think this little the little cracker turns into the body of Jesus Christ I mean think about that and they will use John chapter 6 as a proof text of that because they're so overly literal that they literally think that's what that's what happened but here's the thing you know the wine that they offer in their masses is alcohol and alcohol has leaven and leaven in the Bible is a picture of sin but the blood of Jesus Christ is sinless because he's God and so we see there that a lot of the parallels between the animal sacrifices and Jesus and Jesus Christ's sacrifice you know there's one little thing that the Old Testament sacrifices did not do and that is it didn't come back once it died it was burned up and ate up it just never came back but the sacrifice of Jesus Christ has one element and that is that it was delivered again for our offenses but it was raised again for our justification the resurrection of Jesus Christ is a staple doctrine of the Christian faith because it proves that Jesus Christ is God and that death has no dominion over God he's able to take his life again and therefore we are able to resurrect as well because he resurrected himself he came back to life after three days and three nights and obviously you know we're nearing Easter and that's a wonderful time of celebration and I love the resurrection I love the doctrine of the resurrection and you know it's a good time to talk about the fact that he didn't die on Friday there's no such thing as Good Friday you know every Friday is good to me but there's no such thing as Good Friday because they often say well you know it's Good Friday because that's when he died and I talked to that I mentioned this in a previous sermon already no I talked to this Catholic online he's actually a priest in training so he's going to like a seminary but believe it or not he's actually the most respectable Catholic that I spoke to most other Catholics that I talked to online are calling me all kinds of names and say they say I'm a faggot because I'm calling out the Catholic Church and just all this ad hominem but this guy was actually super respectable but obviously if he doesn't get saved he's gonna go apostate for sure because he actually supposedly was a Christian before and you know when he became a Catholic because this is like a trend right now where you have these Protestants becoming Catholics and what it is is they're not saved and they're apostatizing right well he was a Protestant at a Baptist Church okay and his Baptist pastor told him like oh you got to listen to this guy online his name is pastor Bruce Mejia let me let me shoot you his Instagram he's like man I listen to his podcast all the time the rod of iron and I don't know who the pastor is but then this guy got into the content like he really liked the podcast he listens to the sermon he's probably listening right now but he listens to it and you know we're talking about this particular subject and he's like yeah I don't know why you believe that he died on Thursday I'm like I just simple math you know I was like how long was he dead for it he's like three days and three nights I was like how many nights between Friday and Sunday he's like well there's Friday night there's Saturday night simple math you know you don't even need to be spear-filled for that one how's that and he's a that's interesting I don't I mean I think about that one I'm like yeah you do you know but obviously he has worse issues than that it's not even saved and I and what I end up telling him I said you know at the end of the conversation I told him what you need to do is just pray to God and say if I'm wrong tell me that I'm wrong I said if you really love the truth that's what you'll do and if he doesn't get saved is he didn't really do it you know because anybody who legitimately wants the truth you know they will be found of God and so the point that I'm making here is the resurrection is an important facet of our of our Christian faith and in fact if someone rejects the resurrection of Jesus Christ they're not saved okay they can say that Jesus died for them all they want and they've accepted Jesus as their Savior but if they don't believe that Jesus Christ physically arose from the grave physically not spiritually not a spirit not Casper like he physically came out of the grave if they don't believe that they're not saved and that's not a crazy statement okay but this is why the sacrifice of Jesus Christ is superior to the Old Testament sacrifices even though there's so many parallels to them we know that the Old Testament sacrifice was a shadow of the sacrifice of Christ the difference being that the sacrifice of Christ carried with it one of the most important facets which is the resurrection which is far more clearly laid out in the New Testament it's sprinkled throughout the old and people in the Old Testament believed in the resurrection by the way so don't give me this all you know they didn't believe in the resurrection back they believed in the resurrection you know David spake of the resurrection and they're speaking if they're speaking of the resurrection of Christ they're implying that they know that they're gonna be resurrected as well okay now look at verse 15 we're gonna look at the effectiveness of his offering it says in verse 15 wherefore the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us for after he had said before excuse me for after he had said before this is the covenant that I will make with them after those days say it the Lord I will put my laws into their hearts and then their minds will I write them and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more referring to the totality of forgiveness verse 18 now we're remission of these is there is no more offering for sin having therefore brethren boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus by a new and living way which he had consecrated for us through the veil that is to say his flesh and having an high priest over the house of God let us draw near with the true heart and full assurance of faith having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water now what is he talking about here well in the Old Testament what you have was the priests of the Old Testament had to be ritually purified with water before they can operate the service of the house of God and if they forgot if they chose not to it was like they were done for they can die you know it was just not a good thing for them and so that was something that was consistently done and often the the water that was purified was often sprinkled with the ashes of the heifer that was sacrificed so the ashes would be placed in this basin with water this is actually holy water is legitimately holy water back in those days and they would essentially wash their hands they would wash their feet and this is something that they would do continuously now in the New Testament it says that we can draw near just as those priests wanted to draw near to the holiest of all well now we can draw near with the truth with the true heart in full assurance of faith because our hearts have been sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies have been washed with pure water understand and the sanctification that it's referring to is not baptism okay because the last time I checked ashes weren't being put in the baptistry or in any baptistry for that matter and here's the thing is that you know you can get baptized all you want and we're for baptism here amen I mean we're Baptists it's what we do that's how we roll we baptize converts right but it doesn't matter how many times you get baptized your heart can never be sprinkled from an evil conscience like we can put like really good water in there but it will never wash your heart from an evil conscience because it's just water I mean put it this way it can't even wash away the dirt off your skin unless you're unless you scrub water can only do so much but here you have these people who believe in baptismal regeneration they literally think you have to be baptized in order to be saved and what's crazy about this by the way it's a Catholic doctrine but the Pentecostals also believe it the crazy thing about this is they literally call it baptismal regeneration you said what's so crazy about that well the Bible literally says in Titus 3 5 not by works of righteousness which we have done we got we got persecution pizza back there not by works of righteousness which we have done but according to his mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration that's that word we saw right and renewing a baptism no of the Holy Ghost so when they say like baptismal regeneration and they claim that you have to be physically baptized in water to be saved it's just wild to think that because the Bible literally uses that term and it's only used twice in the Bible regeneration is only used twice the first time it's used is in the Gospels when it's talking about the resurrection the second time that it's used is in Titus 3 5 and it says it's the Holy Spirit who does that and there's no mention of baptism I know it says washing and I know people think that it has something to do with water but what the Bible is talking about there is the fact that our sins are washed away when we believe on Jesus Christ and let me just say this water can't wash away your sins the blood of Jesus washes away your sins but somehow we're to believe that somehow you know the Catholic holy water can wash away your sins if you do a little cross on your forehead you know and and there's some that stuff is nasty anyways people have gotten like infections from that so it's more it's actually it should be called unholy water and only that but you know the blood of Jesus the only thing that can wash away our sins and sanctify us okay and so I was gonna go through these Old Testament passages but I'm running out of time here you know in the Old Testament they would clean they would cleanse their hands and their feet well like matter you know we're supposed to cleanse our feet as well spiritually speaking just like I preached a couple weeks ago about Jesus washing the feet of his disciples he's referring to the fact that on a daily basis we need a spiritually we need a spiritual cleansing because our spiritual feet are constantly walking in the world and it's picking up the filth of this world the dirt of this world and therefore we need our spiritual feet wash with the water with the Word of God in order for it to cleanse us right you know as you're in the world you're at your public school you're in your secular job you're around unsafe people you're constantly getting worldly ideologies being inserted into you and if you're not careful you can get carried away and deceived and build up worldly habits you can become a very carnal individual in that manner so it's important that you get a daily dose of the Bible every single day okay this is why I focus is important listen to me new converts you need to read the Bible every single day even if it's for like 10 15 minutes you need to read it every single day your spiritual life depends on it now your salvation but your spiritual life does you know I get three meals a day in physically to keep this body functioning the way it's supposed to be how much more spiritually should you be feeding yourself man should not live by bread alone but by every word that preceded out of the mouth of God I hope you're making time to read the Bible and for your new people the best way to start reading is just starting the book of John read a couple verses read a chapter a day then move on to Matthew Mark and Luke get a Bible reading schedule from us so we can teach you how to read the Bible but you need to be consuming the Bible not devotionals not the you version devotion on your phone where they take one verse and they give you you know man's opinion the entire way you need to be reading the Bible you don't need a commentary on the Bible you have the greatest commentator living within you call the Holy Spirit he's the one who wrote the Bible so why are we gonna reference people who are writing books about the Bible when the author lives in us it's common sense right and for you seasoned Christians I hope you're keeping up with your Bible reading you know we're in March now and so maybe you fell off the wagon maybe you're just you know you're you fell behind on your Bible reading and you got to Leviticus or something you're just like I don't understand all these kidneys and you know fat this and all that yeah this seems kind of where's the other stuff you know you need to pick up the Bible again and read it again and start again and look treat the Bible and I'm not being I'm not trying to be disrespectful here treat the Bible like a SAT exam you know what I mean by that I don't do they even do SATs anymore I remember when we took the SAT exams they would say or any exam for that matter they would say if you don't know the answer to one just skip it right and come back to it later that's what they would say I don't know if they still say that maybe they say if you don't know the answers because you don't know what gender you are and you guys you know I don't know what they tell you nowadays you know but you know what if you if you come across something in the Bible you don't understand don't get discouraged and get derailed just keep reading just come back later you're gonna read the Bible for the rest of your life you're gonna come back to it again and then next year when you read it again and you're just like I still don't get it don't worry you got the following year and you come back the next year you don't get it it's okay because you're gonna read it for the rest of your life eventually you'll get it but what you don't want to sacrifice it what you don't want to do is say well I'm just not gonna read the Bible at all because I just don't get it you know you're not gonna get everything overnight just keep reading the Bible it's important for you to consume the Word of God every single day you better start tomorrow morning and read the Bible again and esteem the Word of God because it is your necessary food okay let's move on here I'm almost done look at verse 23 it says here let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering for it is faithful to promise and let us consider one another to provoke it to love and to good works not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is but exhorting one another and so much the more as you see the day approaching verse 26 says if we sin for if we sin willfully after that we receive the knowledge of the truth there remain there's no more sacrifice for sins let me explain a couple things regarding verse 25 and 26 verse 25 is obviously referring to church right don't forsake the assembly now you know the Bible doesn't give a specific amount of services that you have to attend the Bible doesn't even say we should have three services that's just what we do you know traditionally as Baptist we do it and it it's something that has worked for us because you know it helps us to learn the Bible but we do have this verse that says not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together so in other words anytime the church is assembled don't forsake it even if it's a Thursday amen you know the Thursday is like I feel like Baptist treated as like the redhead stepchild of services some people treat it it's not as glamorous you know you're just going verse by verse doing a Bible study and it's a lot easier for Christians to undermine the importance of a Thursday night service because all the traffic and oh it's dark and oh my hair hurts or you know oh whatever and they're always coming up with excuses why not to be in church and this is what I always tell people you need to come up with excuses why you should be in church and the excuses for you to be in church far outweigh the excuses for you to miss church and at the end of the day the Bible says don't forsake the assembling now there's pastors who have the philosophy that you could be right with God even if you attend one service and they're absolutely right but you know what I don't think anybody here just wants to be just like an average Christian though you know and I think he's referring to just like if you're just trying to do the bare minimum but are we really called to do the bare minimum as Christians in fact if you want to thrive as a Christian if you want your family to thrive as a Christian you need to be at all the services and it does require a little bit of sacrifice it does require for you to drive at night but guess what you know Sunday is coming and it's time change Sunday so it'll be lighter later and now you really won't have an excuse amen but all that to say that when it says be in churches because when you're in church you are exhorted that's what it says exhorting one another and so much the more as you see the day approaching what does that mean the brothers and sisters in Christ will exhort you in the faith help you to overcome sin help you to learn godliness and righteousness and temperance principles of the Christian faith but hold on a second but if you sin willfully after that you receive the knowledge of the truth there remain is no more sacrifice for sin so what is this verse referring to well again people will say well this means that if you sin after you you know receive the knowledge of the truth you're saved you know Jesus Christ is not going to sacrifice himself for you again but that's not what it means because we literally read a bunch of verses where he sacrificed once and for all and his sacrifice is sufficient for the totality of our sins so what does it talk about let me just explain to you very simply he's saying we're not in the Old Testament where when you've made it offense you can just literally go to a tabernacle you can go to the temple and offer a sacrifice for your sins we're not under that system anymore so if you continue in sin unrepentant sin you're disobeying God it's not like you can just go to the tabernacle and atone for that daily sin anymore you see in the New Testament it's better but you know what the consequences can be heavier too now look what it goes on to say in verse 27 but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fire indignation which shall devour the adversaries he that despised Moses law died without mercy under two or three witnesses what is he saying people who continue in will for sin in the Old Testament is the equivalent to despising Moses law what happened to them they were publicly executed for capital crimes adultery was punishable by death right murder was punishable by death you know there's a long list of things we can think of it it's just punishable by death it's a capital crime and they had no mercy so this is referring to things that if you were to do today yeah you know what if you commit murder today you're gonna suffer the fiery indignation punishment of God and it's not referring to hell it's just referring to you're gonna suffer the consequences of your actions and this is what we tell people when we go out soloing we tell them we're not saying that once you get saved you can live however you want we're just saying that if you do choose to live however you want you're not gonna go to hell but God will punish you here on this earth God will make sure that he strikes you down and he's gonna hit you where it hurts now thank God if and when he does if you're unrepentant and you die you go to heaven but you know how about we just you know don't do that though how about we just keep living longer here and not suffer the consequences of our actions I've been as a Christian going on 17 years and I've heard of many stories of people who backslid for long periods of time you know what happened to them they died miserably horrendously and it's just like yeah that person will say it because they suffered the fiery indignation of God God punished them is what was what he did he said well no no this is referring to someone losing their salvation well look at verse 29 says of how much sore punishment suppose ye shall he be thought worthy who hath trodden under the foot of the Son of God and if counted the blood of the Covenant listen to this wherewith he was sanctified so we're talking about saved people because he says this is someone who is sanctified well how can you call a person sanctified if they're sinning I'll tell you how just the way you call law a just man even though he's living in Sodom and Gomorrah he says wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing and has done despite unto the Spirit of Grace for we know him that hath said vengeance belongeth unto me I will recompense ate the Lord and again listen to this the Lord shall judge his people now we often use this verse for the enemies of God and it's definitely applicable but there's a secondary application to this as well because God also strikes vengeance on his people so people who continue in sin they're unrepentant they're out there committing adultery they're out there fornicating they're out there you know committing any kind of crimes they're not gonna get away with it because as we're gonna see in two weeks the whom the Lord loveth he chasin it then scourges every son whom he receiveth and here's the thing folks if you go living your life and unconfessed in you're just drinking alcohol you know that it's wrong you're just smoking marijuana you're just fornicating you're just kind of living a carnal life you're not serving God okay hey thank God you're not gonna go to hell but you know what you're making your trip to heaven really painful though because he's probably you know let's just talk about Saul for a minute Saul was a saved man but the end of his life sucked and that's his fault God literally told him I'm gonna kill you like tomorrow thou and thy son shall be you know he told Samuel to tell him tomorrow thou and thy son shall be with me it's just a cold line to say you and your sons are gonna die tomorrow you know where I'm at I'm in heaven and you guys are gonna be with me that's just another way of saying like God's gonna kill you what is that it's called God's vengeance on that person and you know he ends up getting wounded by the enemies and he knows he's gonna die so you know what he does he asked his armor-bearer to like kill him he's like because if these uncircumcised Philistines get me they're gonna abuse my body and then the armor-bearer wouldn't didn't want to so then he just committed suicide you're like well you know he committed suicide and at least he's in heaven yeah he's in heaven but here we are thousands of years later talking about how dishonorable he is so he left his legacy of just being a dishonorable person I mean Saul's not necessarily your poster child for godly living in the beginning he was but he's kind of like a byword and a proverb he ended up dying like that and you know that was God's vengeance upon him I don't want God to strike vengeance upon my life I want to just bask in his blessing just obey him and try my best to just serve him and thankfully you know God is gracious with us so even if we have a season of rebellion in our hearts of disobedience he's very long-suffering towards us and I think one of the reasons why is because his punishment is so severe he doesn't want to do that sometimes he has to though and if you've been a Christian for any length of time you know what that feels like we've all been there if you've been a Christian for any length of time you know what it's like to be under the chest chastising hand of God and in fact look what it says in verse 31 it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of a living God and you know what it is a fearful thing because God always hit you where it hurts one of the best ways to stay motivated to serve God is knowing that you're gonna receive rewards that your life is gonna be blessed but you know another one is you know you won't get whooped by God and don't have this attitude well you know I could take it he'll bring you to your knees my friend he'll bring you to your knees he will cause you to rethink your life you'd be like you know what I think I'm gonna serve God for the rest of my life you know and I think I'm gonna just clean up my life now and get right with God because this hurts and so it's important for us to realize that yeah the remainder no more sacrifice for sins yeah we're out of the Old Testament we don't have to do those animal sacrifices yeah but now like if you continue in willful sin where you're like doing things that are just really displeasing unto the Lord God's gonna punish you really hard because tomb so very much is given of him shall be much required you're responsible for more now you have more knowledge of the we have more knowledge of the Bible than many of the people the Old Testament did even people in the New Testament let's finish up here verse 32 says but call to remembrance the former days in which after you were illuminated he endured a great fight of afflictions partly whilst you were made a gazing stock both by reproaches and afflictions and partly be whilst he became companions of them that were so used for ye had compassion of me and my bonds and took joyfully the spoiling of your goods knowing in yourselves that ye have in heaven a better and an enduring substance it was just funny Paul's just like hey but you know what just you know just think about those days when you first got saved and you know you're just really in you just in it to win it you know you endure the great fight of afflictions he's trying to exhort them this is Paul's exhortative side here verse 35 says cast on away therefore your confidence which has great recompense of reward for you have need of patience that after that you have done the will of God you might receive the promise here's the last couple verses I want to cover and that's it for yet a little while and he that shall come will come and will not tarry now the just shall live by faith but if any man draw back what is it what is drawing back you know willful sinning my soul shall have no pleasure in him God's not pleased when you backslide now to the workspace salvation is backsliding means not saved backsliding means you lost your salvation but who gives a crap what they think because what does the Bible say verse 39 but we are not of them who draw back into perdition but believe to the saving of the soul in other words you won't go you know saw as as ungodly as he became he just never drew back into perdition he never fell so hard that he went straight to hell because the Bible says that the steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord though he fall he shall not utterly be cast down for the Lord upholdeth him with his hand the Bible says it's that same hand the Bible says I given to them eternal life and they shall never perish neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand so you can and I'm not encouraging this but you can backslide hard and if you're saved you just will never go to hell because we're not those who draw back into perdition who are those who draw back into perdition Judas we believe to the saving of the soul and so you can get to a point in your Christian life where you backslide so hard that God has to kill you just because he just he's just trying to impede you from really just making more destruction in chaos in your life so he's just like let's just save the soul quick because this this corruptible flesh is corruptible he's just he just beyond repair she's beyond repair I don't want to be beyond repair I want to be used to repair others you understand and so what a beautiful chapter to signify the forgiveness that we've received but at the same time we have to recognize that although we've been forgiven it doesn't mean we can just have unfettered access to sin and just nothing will ever happen to us here on this earth you know fear God amen that's it let's pray father we thank you so much for your word Lord and thank you for the admonitions the exhortations please help us as your people Lord to keep short accounts with you and plead for forgiveness when we sin against you Lord and we do those things that are not right in your sight help us to be sensitive to those things Lord and to keep a tender heart towards the Word of God and to sanctify our hearts through the Bible and I prayed that you'd help us Lord to never be in a position where we are just willfully sinning unrepentant and develop some sort of arrogant prideful spirit that is unwilling to get right with you Lord may the goodness and forbearance of God lead us to repentance and I pray that you bless us as we go on our way we love you and we thank you pray these things in Jesus name amen