Hebrews 9 & 10 — Pat Kenney

Hebrews 9–10: The Superiority of Christ

Hebrews chapter 9. I'd like to get through chapter 10 also, but I know that probably won't happen. But we'll definitely try to give an overview of these two chapters and dig in a little more. The book of Hebrews is just amazing.

How many of you have been following along in the study as we've been going through? I mean such assurances for us, such encouragement for the believer to press on in, to don't go back. There's nothing that the world or any other religious system has that can compare to what you have in Christ.

He is the superior high priest. There isn't anyone higher. And so the Jewish Christians in the first century, at the time that this was written, the motivation for the letter being written to them was the fact that they were buckling.

They were beginning to think, you know, it's gonna be a little easier and I'm gonna get a little less flack if I just don't get too into this Jesus thing, you know. And I relate, I think we can relate to that today because there are those that don't mind you being religious.

Just don't get too vocal about it, you know. Don't show it too much, you know. Don't let your view be put on my view, you know. And we get, you read the editorial pages and you see all that junk all the time, you know.

People offend it, that Jesus. Well, that's normal and it's what the Word of God said would happen, you know. He's the rock of the fence, you know. If you're crawling around in darkness and the light turns on, you may not like it, you know.

But that's the best thing that could happen to you. And thank the Lord that He turned the light on in our lives, amen. And, you know, He wants to not only just have like a little nightlight going in your life, but He'd like to have like one of these huts.

You just can't hide from these things. And I think that's how He wants us to be when He says, walk in the light. You know, I think that's what He's talking about. Not just my little, you know, LED on my watch, you know, that nobody else can see but me.

But I think He wants us to be beaming. He wants us to be so in love with Him. And the early believers, particularly the Jewish believers, were being persecuted. And I'm not making light of that. It was very difficult for a Jewish person to embrace the Messiah and not be ostracized from all of society and everything they knew of since they were little kids.

And as is true in cultures even today that are so anti-Jesus, that if you become a Christian you can, A, take your life in your hands, B, be disowned from your families, lose your jobs, lose your status as a citizen in some countries.

In some Muslim countries, if you embrace Christ or if you dare to preach Christ to a Muslim, you're taking your life in your hands. So there are difficult times, but here the Lord is saying, what's your alternative?

What's our alternative? Follow after Jesus or what? Follow after my flesh? You know, follow after some fad that's just going to be popular for six months and then you got to buy a bunch of new materials for the next fad?

Buy more books and cassettes for the next fad? And thank the Lord that He gave us His Word, you know, and there's nothing we can do to improve on it. It's already perfect. And if we'll allow our lives to be taught by it and encouraged by it and molded by it, I think A, it'll save you a lot of money, and B, it'll cause you to grow like you never knew you could because it's the Lord Himself that's at work in you.

The Old Covenant Prepared the Way for Christ

Under the old system, they didn't have that. Under the old, all of the old things of the, as you've been learning, as we've been going through Hebrews, though the Old Testament is extremely rich and very vital and important to understanding the New Testament, it was preparatory for what was revealed in Jesus Christ.

It was preparing for the Messiah. Once the Messiah came, all that was used for preparation had accomplished its purpose. It could no longer be, it no longer had a purpose, in essence. The purpose was to prepare for Jesus, to prepare for the Messiah.

Now when you try to go back from salvation by grace through faith in Christ alone and begin to now layer in ritual, you know, which is very easy to do when you're religious. You know, when you start piling on all the little things you do and little services and little rituals, and before you know it, you've lost, you've gone so far away from the vitality and the life and the relationship, the joy of that relationship, into a works effort.

And then you beat yourself up if you're trying to do it on your own strength. And I know a few of us have been there where we tried and tried and tried and tried and then failed miserably. And then you got, then you pile on the guilt on top of that.

So the Lord would have us to walk freely in him and to walk close with him. He's given us a better covenant. The new covenant is better than the old covenant. It doesn't mean the old covenant wasn't important, wasn't divinely given, but the new covenant is better.

And we were exhorted not to forget that. At the end of chapter 8 was building that argument. We can pick it up at verse, let's look at verse 8. Because finding fault with them, he says, Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, because they did not continue in my covenant and I disregarded them, says the Lord.

For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord. And I love this. Quoting Jeremiah here, I will put my laws in their mind and write them on their hearts and I will be their God and they shall be my people.

And none of them shall teach his neighbor and none his brother, saying, Know the Lord, for all shall know me from the least of them to the greatest of them. Wasn't going to be any hierarchy. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness and their sins and their lawless deeds.

Look at this. I will remember no more. Any of you have a bunch of sins and lawless deeds that are still plaguing you? The Lord remembers them no more. When you confess your sin, he takes it. Is that good news?

That's a new covenant. That's a better covenant. And so he says in verse 13, in that he says, a new covenant. He has made the first obsolete. Any of you that are into computers and techno stuff, you know what obsolete means.

You know, anything you buy today, six months from now is obsolete. You know, and if you have, you know, I've got a computer. I upgraded my computer and I was going to give my old one to my son, you know, because he wanted to be able to do email and stuff like that.

And then I realized that for what he wanted to do, just to get a high speed thing, my old little clunker dinosaur just did burn up. He couldn't handle it. It only had like two meg of space on its hard drive or something.

Now, when that came out, wasn't that smoking? Man, you could do so much. Now I got more of that in my cell phone then. So it just sits there and it'll probably sit there for till my wife makes me get rid of it, which might not be too long from now.

Get that thing out of here. Make a good anchor. So the first, he is made obsolete and what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away. Now to us that we may not relate to that because we're already 2000 years, you know, away from that.

But these guys who this was written from the law, you know, the rituals, the temple, all of that stuff was just, that's what they had just come out of. The Lord is saying that with the new covenant, the old is going to vanish away.

It's no longer going to, it's achieved its purpose to try to go back to it when the, that which is perfect, which that perfect sacrifice has already come. Then you're going back to an inferior sacrifice and that will not wash away your sin.

That will not take away the veil. That will not bring you into the Holy of Holies. Because if you go back to the old system, hey, there's still a barrier there. Only the high priest could get into that Holy of Holies once a year on the feast day of atonement.

And then he had to go bring in the blood of a bull and the lambs and he had to bring it not only for the people, but for himself also. So if you're going to go back to the ritual of the temple of the sanctuary, the writer of Hebrews is going to show us that that is going backwards.

It's an inferior sanctuary. There is a superior sanctuary now. It's not here on this earth as a building, but it's in heaven. And the one that was built here to begin with was just a copy. It was copied given the instructions were given to make it according to what was already the perfect in heaven.

So he says, going back to that, I'm doing a new thing. Jeremiah 31, 33. This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days. That's what he's quoting here. I'm going to put my law on their minds and write it on their hearts.

In Ezekiel 36, 26, we read, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you. I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and you'll keep my judgments and do them.

And it'll be a joy. It's not something you're gonna be forced to do, but because you're alive now, my spirit is in you. And you know, whether it's Judaism or dead religion today, I know, you know, there's a lot of religious people that get saved.

Being religious doesn't mean you're born again. Having a membership in a particular denomination or church doesn't mean that you're walking close to Jesus. Are you alive in the Lord? Is he your all in all?

Are you just so stoked to be close to him and to know him and to have him working in your life? And if you're looking at me kind of blank, though, I don't have a clue what you are talking about. Then I would encourage you call on the Lord today and say, Lord, fire me up.

Lord, I want to know you. I don't want to know just a bunch of the rules and the regulations and the rituals. I want to know you, not the things that might be about you. Those are good. Those are nice.

But if I put my trust in them, I'm never, never, never gonna have the the power of the Spirit of God in my life. I'm never gonna be walking in the fullness of what he has. And I think there's a lot of Christians today, you know, that are really stunted because they're settling for just kind of a minimal, minimal walk, minimal relationship.

And they think, well, if I go to church and read my Bible once a week or so, I guess I'm a okay Christian. But I'm telling you tonight, the Lord wants you on fire for him. He didn't die to nominally save you.

He died to rescue you from the tyranny of sin, the monster of our flesh. He died to set us free to love him and to serve him and to walk with him and to be a light for him to others. And if in your walk it's anything less than that, then I would encourage you tonight, call on the Lord.

Ask him for a renewing of your heart. Surrender to him afresh tonight. I don't want to put up with just going to church. I want to be a walking vessel for you to use however you want to use me, Lord. Fill me.

Overflow me. I want to walk with you, Lord. And see, because what often hinders us in that anyway? Oh, Lord, use me. What hinders us? Well, our blow in it, you know, our sin, right? Our failures. And in that oftentimes, you know, instead of just going to the Lord and confessing it and thanking God for forgiving you for dying on the cross for your sin, I think a lot of times we beat ourselves up over and over and over again.

And we say, well, I can't be used because I'm such a jerk. I'm such a failure. And what's the focus of your thinking? You. Not the Lord. You. When we look to him, when we look unto Jesus, the author, the finisher of our faith, we have a perfect high priest.

We have a wonderful king and master who has paid the price for all of our sin. And in fact, God's word tells us he remembers it no more. God wants us to be as the crew, as Paul was writing to the Corinthians in his second letter, chapter three, verse three, he said, clearly you are an epistle of Christ ministered by us, written not with ink, but by the spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of flesh.

That is of the heart. He goes, you guys are living epistles. In other words, it's so obvious you're in love with Jesus. And that's my prayer. It's my prayer for my own life. It's my prayer for you guys should be our prayer for one another.

Lord, let it be just so obvious that we're in love with you. Amen. Thank you, Lord. And first John one, seven says, but if you see why we're probably not going to get to chapter 10, first one, seven says, but if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another and the blood of Jesus Christ, his son cleanses us from all sin who make that so.

Five Reasons the Old Covenant Sanctuary Was Inferior

And so we have a new covenant through and in Jesus Christ. Therefore the structures, the symbols, the sacrifices associated with the old covenant are now superseded by Jesus. And we've seen that Christ's priesthood is better than Aaron's because it belongs to a better order.

As we saw in chapter seven, that of Melchizedek, because it's administered under a better covenant, the new covenant in chapter eight. And here in chapter nine, we're going to see that Christ's priesthood is superior because it's administered from a better sanctuary.

And in chapter 10, the emphasis is on the perfect sacrifice of Jesus in contrast with the imperfect sacrifices that were offered under the old covenant. So again, we're getting, these are all given not to scare people away from following the Lord, but to encourage them that you got the very best press on with it and given very good arguments for not going back.

So here in, as chapter nine opens up, the writer gives five reasons why the old covenant sanctuary was inferior. The first is that it was on the earth. The second was that it was a shadow of things to come.

And we're going to look at a few of those shadows there briefly. Thirdly is that it was inaccessible to the people. You know, the temple wasn't like church here at Calvary Escondido where you could just come on and plop down.

Couldn't do that in the temple. It was temporary and it was ineffective for changing hearts. And it doesn't take long reading the history of Israel, you know, reading through the Old Testament to see that their real problem was the problem of the heart.

Oh, they, you know, obey because they had a strong king at times, but given to themselves, you see this roller coaster thing, you know, and they'd call out to the Lord after they'd blown it and God so many times was faithful to forgive them, you know, but then they'd start boasting in their own power again and they'd crash and burn.

So let's look at these things. Verse 1, chapter 9. The first reason why the old covenant sanctuary was inferior because it was on the earth. And indeed, even the first covenant had ordinances of divine service and the earthly sanctuary.

God gave Moses the pattern from heaven, but Moses built the tabernacle and years later Solomon built the temple on the tabernacle pattern. And it was built on earth of earthly materials. The sanctuary was divinely appointed and the services there in the sanctuary were carried on under God's direction.

Still, everything was on the earth. And as we're going to see in the later part of this chapter, the new sanctuary is heavenly. That's going to make it better because it's going to be eternal. You're not going to have to go change light bulbs and fix plumbing.

You know, things here, they're going to wear out, but our heavenly sanctuary never wears out, even when we start to wear out. And that's encouraging because a few of us are starting to wear out a little bit, you know, but praise God, you know, this is not all there's going to be.

And when we, when we're through here, we just change addresses to our permanent home. Bring it on, Lord, bring it on. Secondly, it was a shadow of things to come in the verses two through five. So for a tabernacle was prepared and he goes into the different parts of it.

The first part in which was the lamp stand and the table and the showbread that was on the table, which is called the sanctuary. And then behind the second veil, the part of the temple, which is called the holiest of all, or the holy of holies, which had the golden sensor, which really could be the golden, the golden table of incense.

And then the arc of the covenant overlaid on all sides with gold in which were the golden pot that had the manna, Aaron's rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant. And above it were the cherubim of glory, overshadowing the mercy seat.

And of these things, we can't now speak in detail. It is good for you to be studying the Old Testament. It's good for you to be learning all of the beautiful types. And it blows your mind how God was setting everything up.

It just is amazing to see Jesus in the Old Testament. And you know, you look at all of these things here, all of the parts of the temple, you know, to the very, you know, the candles, the lampstand, the table of showbread, the altar of incense, the arc of the covenant and the things that were in the arc of the covenant, the mercy seat, all of it, all of it points beautifully to the finished work of Jesus and what he would completely fulfill.

And so let's look at a little bit of it. The tabernacle was prepared, the first part, verse 2, in which was the lampstand, the table, the showbread, which is called the sanctuary. So here he's, the writer is describing the arrangement and the furnishings of the Old Testament tabernacle.

And, you know, we think of the tabernacle, maybe you think of the Mormon tabernacle, you know, you think of this massive structure, but it wasn't really that big. In fact, it could probably fit in a lot of your houses.

Some of your houses are bigger than the tabernacle was. It was a tent, basically, about 45 feet long, 15 feet wide, and was divided into two sections. The first section was 30 feet long and that was called the holy place.

And here it's referred to as the first one, the first part, the first section. The second section was 15 feet long by 15 feet wide and that was called the holy of holies. Now in that first section, the lampstand with a middle stem and six branches stood in that first part.

It's of an unspecified size, it was made of pure gold, it provided the only light in the tabernacle. The nations of Israel were supposed to be a light to the nations and that was what that was symbolic of.

But we know from the stories that they failed in that. The lampstand, though, pointed to Jesus, who is the light of the world. And because Jesus is the light of the world, you and I as believers are to shine as lights in this world.

Amen? Matthew 5, Jesus said, you are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket. God doesn't set you on fire, he doesn't blaze you to hide you.

You know, some people say, well, I'm just, you know, I'm just keeping this to myself. You know, or some people say, why don't you just keep it to yourself? You know, but if you're blazing, it's gonna show.

And it doesn't make any sense to have a bright light that's to light your way in darkness and put a cover over it. So Jesus calls, and then he says, so let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your father in heaven.

In other words, your light isn't to be shined just in your closet. It's to be shined out in public. It's not to be shined just in church. If Jesus is your Lord, everywhere you go and every part of your life is gonna be impacted by him if you'll let him.

Ephesians 5, 8 says, for you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of the light. And in Philippians chapter 2, verse 14, we're exhorted to do, you know, because we wonder, well, how do we do that?

How do we be a light? Well, there's some practical things, but some very simple ones here in Philippians 2, verse 14, do all things without complaining and disputing. Does that convict anybody? Do all things, not just some things, not just things at church when people see you, but do all things.

That means like when you go home. Man, when you bump into old friends, when you're in a restaurant, when you're on the ball field, wherever you are, wherever you are, do all things without complaining and disputing.

We should put that on the back of our jerseys, you know, the men's softball team. That would be that you may become blameless and harmless children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and a perverse generation among whom you shine as lights in the world.

Make us that way, Lord. You know, we teach the little kids in Sunday school, this little light of mine, I'm going to let it shine. This little light of mine, I'm going to let Satan get out. Hide it under a bushel.

Hide it under a bushel. No! I'm going to let it shine. Let your light shine before all men that you love Jesus and you're following after him. And then there was the table, the table of the showbread.

The table sat in the first part. It was also relatively small, three feet long, a foot and a half wide, two feet three inches high. It held twelve loaves of bread, each representing God's fellowship with the twelve tribes of Israel.

And it reminded them of God's presence that sustained them. And it also speaks of today, speaks to us today of Jesus Christ, the bread of life, who was given to the whole world. In John 6, 35, Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life, and he who comes to me shall never hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst.

In verse 51 of John 6, Jesus said, I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats this bread, he'll live forever. And the bread that I shall give is my flesh, which I give for the life of the world.

You want to have life and have it more abundantly? You got to fall in love with Jesus. That's just the simple key to abundant life, walking in love with Jesus. Walk in love with him, obey him, because if you love him, you're going to obey him.

Didn't he say that? If you love me, keep my commandments. And you'll find your life to be literally overflowing with the work and the power of God. It is that simple. We complicate it. We make excuses.

We try to bend God to approve things that he tells us we shouldn't be doing. Amen? It's a good place for an amen. We don't like to say amen to that, because we like to do the stuff we like to do. Amen?

Yeah. But he said, if you love me, keep my commandments. And none of the Lord's commandments to us are punitive. He doesn't do it to beat us up. He does us to keep us safe. He gives us his commands to protect us and to nurture us and to help us to grow, not to hinder us.

And if you'll just simply love the Lord and obey his word, my goodness, God's going to use you mightily. Then verse 3, behind the second veil, the part of the tabernacle which is called the holiest of all, which had the golden censer.

Warren Mearsby says on this, the golden censer really should be translated altar. The golden altar stood in the holy place just in front of the veil that divided the two parts of the tabernacle. It did not stand in the holy of holies, that 15 by 15 inner sanctuary, but its ministry pertained to the holy of holies.

How? On the annual day of atonement, the high priest used coals from this altar to burn incense before the mercy seat within the veil. Also, each morning and evening, a priest burned incense on this altar and David, when he was speaking of it in Psalm 141, suggested that it was a picture of prayer ascending to God.

Psalm 141 verse 2, let my prayer be set before you as incense, the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice. And it can remind us that Jesus intercedes for us constantly before the very throne of God.

That blesses me to know that when I'm out of gas and I've been there and you've been there, that he never forgets us. He never stops interceding for us. You can be assured at your weakest point, Jesus is holding you and interceding for you.

And if you'll allow him and rest in him, no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly. Now, be careful of how you define no good thing because I might want to have, you know, a 64 inch plasma, high definition.

That's a good thing. Watch my Padre games in great detail, you know. But I don't think that's what the Lord had in mind. A lot of times we mistake temporal pleasure and material satisfaction for good things.

I think God's got a different definition of good. It's a definition that goes beyond the surface and goes way inside. That's like when we talk about a good person, that you're not good because of all that you have or your position or your power or your influence per se, but you're good because he who is good has done a good work in you.

And you have a tender conscience. I pray for that. Lord, keep my conscience so sensitive to you. Give me that healthy fear of God in my inner being. Let me be worried about getting caught. I don't want to get away with sin.

Lord, if you need to nail me, nail me. And then there was the Ark of the Covenant, overlaid on all sides with gold in which were the golden pot that had the manna, Aaron's rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant.

Again, the Ark of the Covenant, not a very big thing in terms of size. It was a chest made of acacia wood, covered with gold, three and three quarters feet long, two and a quarter feet wide, two and a quarter feet high.

You know, if we turn this podium on its side, it'd be about this size, with rings for poles along its side, which would be, by which it was supposed to be carried. And inside it, there was manna. There was a jar with manna in it.

And the manna reminded Israel of God's provision and their ungratefulness. Because you know the story, right? You know, just read through those, read through the book of Genesis and Exodus. If you haven't done it lately, you should do that at least once a year.

You know, just take your time through the word every day. You know, it won't be too long before these pictures will become more and more familiar to you. Aaron's rod reminded them of their rebellion against God's authority.

And the tablets of the covenant reminded them of their failure to keep the Ten Commandments and the rest of the law. Reminders. And above it were the cherubim of glory, verse five, overshadowing the mercy seat.

And of these things, he says, we can't now speak in detail. The mercy seat was the ornate lid for the Ark of the Covenant, made with the designs of cherubim upon it, sort of angel-like beings. And the blood of sacrifice was sprinkled upon it for the forgiveness of Israel's sin on the Day of Atonement.

And as God looked down into the Ark, he saw the symbols of Israel's sin, their rebellion, and their failure. But when the blood of sacrifice was applied to the mercy seat, which was basically the top lid of the Ark, his sight of the sin of Israel was covered by the blood of sacrifice.

All these things pointed to Jesus and were shadows of the great spiritual realities that God would give in the new covenant. Folks, the way into the presence of God has been open to all who would believe in Jesus.

It's not a closed system anymore. It's wide open. Whoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be on probation for... Now, if you really want to be saved, you've got to go through two years of classes, you know, and then we'll have this ritual and give you a certificate that you're saved.

I'm a sinner, and I believe you died for me, Jesus. And I don't understand it, but I believe you rose again and you're alive now, and I need you, Lord. Just wash me clean. Take over in my life. And immediately, a supernatural work of God will begin in your life.

And that heavenly sanctuary now is wide open. Wide open. The throne of God. You know, I mean, the throne that embodied the presence of God within the nation was in that holy of holies. That's where it's often said in the Old Testament that God dwelt in the midst of his people, right there, and only one guy, once a year, could go in there.

But for us, it's through Jesus. Is that better? It's much better. Much better. So it was on the earth, verse 1 tells us, verses 2 to 5, it was but a shadow of things to come. The next couple of verses show that it was inaccessible to the people, just what we're talking about.

Verse 6, now when these things had been thus prepared, the priests always went into the first part of the temple performing the services. But into the second part, there it is. The high priest went alone, once a year, and not without blood, which he offered for himself and for the people's sins committed in ignorance.

So only the priests of the tribe of Levi, only they could minister in the court and in the holy place. They were the only ones that could go in there. And only the high priest could enter the holy of holies.

Praise God, the heavenly sanctuary, which we'll see in the next few verses, verse 11 and on, is open to all of God's people. So it was on earth, it was but a shadow of things to come, it was inaccessible to the people, that's why it was inferior.

Fourthly, it was temporary. Verse 8, the Holy Spirit indicating this, that the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest while the first tabernacle was still standing. There was a veil there, it was blocked off.

It was symbolic for the present time in which both gifts and sacrifices are offered, which cannot make him who performed the service perfect in regard to the conscience. You see, the veil between men and God, where men could come and then where men could not come, the veil reminded the people that the way into God's presence had not yet been open.

Every priest knew that, every child of Israel knew that when they came to Israel for the feasts and they gathered around the temple, but they knew that that veil was there. Verse 9 says that while the veil remained, there would still be two parts to the tabernacle, which is a symbol, a figure, a parable of the relationship between Israel and God.

When Christ died, what happened to the veil? It was ripped, the was torn from top to bottom by God himself and the need and the veil, by the way, the veil wasn't just, you know, like, like an old sheet, you know, that any one of us could just go and rip it, but it was made of woven goat's hair.

They estimate six to eight inches thick and that thing was ripped from top to bottom when Jesus paid the sacrifice, paid the complete price for your sins and mine. When Christ died, the veil was torn and at that moment the need for an earthly sanctuary was abolished.

And that's really why in the church we don't have a lot of ornate symbolism. I know some churches do, but we don't here because we have the real thing. If you get too many symbols, you can get caught up in the symbols and once you're caught up in the symbols, you've walked away from relationship.

You can't have relationship with symbols. Amen? You can't. And eventually that's what it can become. It can become idolatry, you know, you know, and there's some beautiful symbols out there, but I know some folks that are wrapped up in different denominations and they worship the symbols.