To Put Away Sin, Part 1 – Hebrews 9:25-26

With your Bibles open to Hebrews chapter 9.

Let's pray together.

Oh Lord, we do ask that you would sanctify our hearts by your truth, sanctify us, conform us to the image of Christ. We pray that you would use your word today to put down, to cast down every idol in our hearts, every other source of trust and confidence that we have and that we may see and behold in your word the glory of Christ and Christ alone.

Be honored in this way and through the teaching of your word we pray today. In Jesus' name, amen. All of our sufficiency in life and in death, in living and in dying, is to be found in Christ and Christ alone.

And the more we know of the truth about him, the more we are able to gaze upon his glory revealed in scripture and come to a confident understanding of who he is and what he has done for us on the cross, the more we're able to apprehend that, then the more we will abandon all of our confidences in all of the other things that we typically trust in for salvation and sanctification and security.

And really the goal of our Christian life is one continual pursuit of trying to abandon confidences in every other thing and to find our sufficiency and in Christ and in Christ alone. And we are constantly, since our hearts are idol factories, we are constantly coming up with things that we want to trust in for our sanctification or our security or our righteousness or our salvation that are not Jesus Christ.

And the goal of the author of Hebrews is to get his readers to cast aside everything else, to not turn back to the old covenant ways, whether it's the tabernacle or the priesthood or the sacrifices or the mediators in any way whatsoever, but to rely and rest upon Christ and to Christ alone.

And to that end, we must constantly be reminded of the sufficiency of Jesus Christ and what he has done. We want to behold his glory afresh all the time. We want to hear of the glories of his sacrifice and the depth of his redeeming love and the unalterable redemptive purposes that he has.

We want to see the truth about his death and know of his will to save, his power to save, and his sovereignty to save. And when we meditate upon those things and we think upon them and we reflect upon them, they serve the purpose of taking out of our hearts all the other idols and all the other confidences that we have and reposing our heart and our soul on Christ and Christ alone for every benefit, every glory, every spiritual blessing, and everything that we need.

Our sufficiency is in Jesus Christ and in him alone. And the author of Hebrews wants his readers to come to that conclusion. So he is constantly comparing Christ to all of the other things that might distract them from Jesus or that might also compete for their affections or for their confidences, like the priests, the sacrifices, the tabernacle, and the old covenant.

And he is intending to show that Christ is superior to all of them so that he might, the author of Hebrews would have known this, but that he might get us to be able to sing with confidence, my hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness.

I dare not trust the sweetest frame but wholly lean on Jesus' name. That's the goal. Ultimately, we come to Christ and we trust in him for salvation, but then the rest of our Christian life is really about reposing ourselves again and again on the person of Christ and finding in him all of our sufficiency for all of our hope and all of our confidence.

So here at the end of this ninth chapter of Hebrews, which we are in, we're looking at this comparison between the work of Christ and his sacrifice on the cross for us and comparing that with the Old Testament priests and their sacrifices and the blood of bulls and goats and animals.

And today, we're going to note five differences between the sacrifice of Christ and the sacrifice of those Old Testament animals. And these five things, I am certain you already know this. I'm certain that most of you here already know this and believe this.

And I'm certain of that because you are here worshiping today, trusting in Jesus, and you're not in your backyard right now offering a sacrifice of animals and sprinkling blood on altars and garments, et cetera.

So you already have this confidence in Christ, but my hope is today that as we reflect upon the uniqueness of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, that it will serve to repose your hearts once again on Jesus Christ and the glories of what he has done for us.

So there are five things in verses 25, and we left off really in chapter nine with verse 24 last week. We looked at 23 and 24. So we're picking it up in the middle of the sentence with verse 25, and in verse 25 and 26, we're gonna notice five unique qualities of the sacrifice of Christ.

And as we read through the passage, I'm gonna point these five things out to you. I'll give them to you first. It's a one-time sacrifice, an end-time sacrifice, a public sacrifice, gotta think of that for a second, public sacrifice, a powerful sacrifice, and then a personal sacrifice.

So let's read verses 25, and I'll point these five things out to you. Verse 25, let's back up to verse 24. Christ did not enter a holy place, made with hands, a mere copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us.

Nor was it that he would offer himself often as the high priest enters the holy place, year by year, with a blood that is not his own. Otherwise, he would have needed to suffer often since the foundation of the world, but now, once, at the consummation of the ages, he has been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

Look at verse 26, now once, it's a one-time sacrifice, at the end of the ages, it's an end-of-time sacrifice, he has been manifested, it is a public sacrifice, to put away sin, that is the power of it, by the sacrifice of himself, it's a personal sacrifice.

Those five qualities are uniquely different. They set the sacrifice of Jesus Christ apart from all the other sacrifices of the Old Testament, and demonstrate the glory of it and the sufficiency of it.

So let's look first at the fact that it is a one-time sacrifice. Verse 26, he says that Christ has not entered the holy place made with hands, he didn't offer himself often, as the high priest enters the holy place, year by year, with blood that's not his own, but now, once, one sacrifice.

Now this is not the first time that the author of Hebrews has mentioned the singularity or the singular nature of the sacrifice of Jesus. Back in chapter seven, verse 27, he says that Christ does not need daily, like those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for his own sins, and then for the sins of the people, because he did this once for all when he offered up himself.

But now, this singular nature of the death of Christ, the one-time aspect of it, that it only happened once, this becomes the focus of the rest of this chapter, and quite frankly, the first 18 verses of chapter 10.

This is what the author is going to zero in now, is this singular nature, this one-time nature of the sacrifice of Jesus. It's entirely unique, and it's quite shocking to a Jewish mind to consider this.

In fact, as we read through verses 25, I want you to just glance through verses 25 to 28, these last four verses of the chapter, and I want you to notice the references to often and once. Verse 25, nor was it that he, that is Christ, would offer himself often, as the high priest enters the holy place year by year.

Verse 26, otherwise, he would have needed to suffer often, since the foundation of the world, but now, once, at the consummation of the ages. Notice the contrast between something that is done repeatedly, that is often, and now once, and the author now is zeroing in on this singular nature of Christ's atonement.

So he says in verse 27, and that as much as it is appointed to men to die once, and after this comes the judgment, so Christ, also having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time for salvation, without reference to sin, to those who eagerly await him.

That contrast between often and once, and the contrast here in this passage is not just between the singular nature of what Christ has done in his sacrifice, but also the singular nature of what Christ did in entering into heaven.

Notice how verse 25 sort of sets up that contrast. It was not that he would offer himself often, as the high priest enters the holy place year by year, with blood that is not his own. The entrance of the high priest into the holy place, behind the veil, to apply blood to the ark of the covenant, was something that was done, as it says, once a year, it was done often, but that is paralleled with Christ's entrance into heaven.

And the purpose of the author here is to point out that Jesus has gone to heaven, but he has not come back. He will come back, verse 28, and when he does, it's not going to be to offer another sacrifice, and it's not going to be to deal with the sin issue, because he's already put away sin once and for all by the sacrifice of himself.

So when he returns in verse 28, it's not going to be meek and mild Jesus coming to deal with the sin issue. It's going to be the king of kings and the lord of lords coming to deal with sinful rebels who will not bow the knee to Christ.

He is returning, but in the meantime, he has entered into heaven only one time. And so there is the parallel between the entrance of Christ into heaven once, not to leave, and the entrance of the holy priest often, year by year.

And the holy priest would always go into the holy of holies with the blood that was not his own, and apply that to the ark of the covenant, and then immediately come out. Well, our lord has gone into heaven one time, and he has not returned.

He has not needed to leave. Because our savior, this is a magnificent thought, our savior stands in the presence of the father and beholds the glory of the great God in all of its fullness without any shame.

And he does not need to leave that presence because the father was satisfied with his sacrifice and vindicated that sacrifice by raising him from the dead. And now Philippians two says, because he humbled himself to the point of death, God has highly exalted him and given him the name, which is above every name so that the name of Jesus, every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of the father.

And now he has taken his seat at the right hand of the father in the heavenlies, and he has sat down there in the presence of the father, waiting until all of his enemies be made a footstool for his feet, and then he will return.

But until that time, he has only entered in one time. So just as there is a connection with the Old Testament priest who would take the blood and he would enter behind the veil to apply the blood to the Ark of the Covenant, he would go in, but then he would come out, our Savior having offered one sacrifice for sins, that one time has entered into heaven.

He has no need to come out because he has no need to offer another sacrifice. The Old Testament priest always had to come out to do what? To offer another sacrifice, because he couldn't hang out in the Holy of Holies because the next year he had to leave the Holy of Holies because he couldn't stand in the presence of God.

He could apply that blood, but he had to immediately leave. And then the next year he would have to make that same sacrifice all over again. There's a one-to-one correspondence between the number of sacrifices that were offered and the number of times that the high priest went behind the veil.

Remember on the Day of Atonement, he would offer a sacrifice first for himself and for his family, and he would go behind the veil and apply the blood there, and then he would come out and offer a sacrifice for the sins of the people.

And then he would go behind the veil and he would apply the blood. Every time the high priest went behind the veil, he had to offer a sacrifice. They couldn't store up the blood in a container and use it year after year.

They could have harvested enough blood, and I don't mean to be gory here, but they could have harvested enough blood from one sacrifice to apply to that Ark of the Covenant year after year for decades if they could have found a way to seal it up and to preserve it year after year, but they didn't do that.

He applied the blood, and every time he went back in, he had to offer a new sacrifice. So Jesus Christ has gone into heaven one time. What does that say about his sacrifice? How many sacrifices has he offered?

Only once. And this, by its very nature, would have been shocking to a Jew. One sacrifice? The Jews were used to thinking of multiple sacrifices, continual sacrifices, perpetual sacrifices, endless sacrifices.

More sacrifices than they cared to count was part of their daily ritual and their yearly life. And now along comes the New Testament and the apostles and said he has offered one sacrifice. This is mind-blowing to a Jew.

One sacrifice? So he's only offered one sacrifice? Is that a detriment? No, that actually speaks of its glory. He's offered one sacrifice. Therefore, you need not trust anything else. Therefore, nothing else would demand your confidence.

No other sacrifice needs to be made because in that one sacrifice, that one-time sacrifice, he has put away sin always, entirely, perfectly, completely. The sin issue has been dealt with, so no other sacrifice is needed.

If he has entered heaven once, he only needed to offer one sacrifice. And the fact that he has entered heaven and sat down in the Father's presence demonstrates the glory and the sufficiency and the power and the completeness of what that one sacrifice has accomplished.

It was a one-time sacrifice. And it had to be an all-or-nothing sacrifice. Notice the argument of the author in verse 26 where he talks about Christ not needing to offer himself to enter into heaven often or to offer himself often.

Otherwise, verse 26, he would have needed to suffer often since the foundation of the world. What's the author saying there? He's saying, look, the sacrifice of Christ is either completely and perfectly sufficient so that only one sacrifice needs to be met or it is insufficient and must be offered over and over again.

If the sacrifice of Christ needed to be offered twice, then it needed to be offered thousands upon thousands of times, just like animal sacrifices. In fact, if the sacrifice of Christ is not infinitely, perfectly, and completely sufficient to deal with the sin issue in its entirety, if it is not perfectly sufficient to that end, then it is not sufficient for anything and it is, in fact, no better than any of the Old Testament animal sacrifices.

If it doesn't deal with sin completely, then he would need to come and offer himself often since the foundation of the world to continue to deal with that. And that puts him in the same class as the Old Testament animal sacrifices.

But that is not the case. Instead, he is offered one sacrifice for sin, one sacrifice for all time. It really is an all or nothing deal. So then I ask you, what do you trust in? Where's your hope or your confidence?

What do you trust in and what do you cast your hope in to expunge your sin and to remove the record of your guilt? The death of Christ on the cross plus what? Plus what? What do you trust in to take away all of your sins and to make you completely righteous in the sight of the Father?

What do you trust in to dismiss your court case with all of its myriad of transgressions and sins and crimes against the benevolent King of Heaven? What do you trust in to satisfy divine justice on your account?

What do you trust in, the death of Christ plus what? To allow the Father to treat you as if you have never sinned in fact, to treat you as if you have done only righteousness and then to adopt you into his family and to treat you as if he treats his righteous son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

What do you trust in for that? What do you trust in so that you can enjoy eternal delight and eternal glory in the presence of the Father and to behold the Holy One eventually face to face? What do you trust in to grant to you every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Jesus Christ?

The death of Christ plus penance, purgatory, your good deeds, your sacrifices, your asceticism, the things that you give up, your acts of service, your righteousness, what else do you trust in? You see, anybody who has to say that I trust in the death of Christ plus the mass or my observance of communion or my baptism or my service or my continuing in my faith or the strength of my righteous deeds or eventually purgatory to take away my sins, anybody who adds to that is confessing that they do not believe in the sufficiency of the death of Christ to deal with the sin issue.

He has put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. It was a one-time sacrifice. Every gift of grace, every blessing, every benevolent act of kindness that you enjoy, every good gift that comes from the Father toward you and toward me is purchased for us and secured for us by the death of Jesus Christ on the cross, including your repentance and your faith so that no man can boast, everything.

All of it secured in that one death, completely sufficient, a one-time sacrifice. Second, it is an end-time sacrifice. And he said, Jim, at this rate, there's no way we're gonna get through all five of these.

Number two, an end-time sacrifice. Now he says in verse 26, once at the consummation of the ages. One time, a one-time sacrifice, since it is a one-time sacrifice, it therefore marks the completion or the perfection, the fullness of the ages.

That's an interesting phrase and it is an interesting word that is used. It's only used six times in all the New Testament. Five times it's used in the book of Matthew. One time it's used here in Hebrews, this word for consummation.

In the book of Matthew, it's actually translated end. So we're used to hearing in the book of Matthew the end of the ages or the end of the age. I'll give you a couple examples. Matthew 24, verse three.

As he was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately saying, tell us, when will these things happen and what will be the sign of your coming at the end of the age? The same phrase.

Matthew 28, 20. Jesus said to his disciples to go into all the nations and preach the gospel and make disciples of all men, baptizing them, name the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.

That word refers to the completion of something, the fullness of something, the consummation of something, the end of it. But here's the question. If the death of Christ and his sacrifice on the cross marked the end of the age, the consummation of the ages, then where are we at 2 ,000 years later?

If that was the end of it, where are we at now, 2 ,000 years hence the end of it? Are we in a different age, are we in the next age? Is it the same age? It seems like if the end happened 2 ,000 years ago, where are we at?

What should we be expecting? There are 2 ,000 years that have transpired between the end of the age or the consummation of the ages and today. How much longer are we gonna have to wait for the consummation of all things or the end of the ages?

Let me give you two answers to this. There are two ways to think this. The first is to understand and to remember God's perspective on time. With God, 1 ,000 years is a day and a day is 1 ,000 years. That simply means that in his redemptive calendar, his order of events, to say that 2 ,000 years has gone by is really nothing.

Really, the sacrifice of Jesus Christ is at the consummation of the age. Second, the death of Christ is the culmination of God's redemptive work. His sacrifice is at the consummation of the age because it is the zenith, the climax, the end, the fulfillment, the fullness of all of God's redemptive work.

There's nothing to surpass that. There's no stage two. There's no phase two. We're not waiting for the next redemptive act that will deal with the sin issue and secure our salvation. That has already been done.

That has passed. So now, in a sense, in one sense, the rest of this is just wrapping up what has already been accomplished. You can think of it that way. He's gonna gather in his sheep. He's gonna take them to be home with him.

He's gonna pour out his judgments in the tribulation, resurrect Old Testament saints, establish his kingdom, judge the living and the dead, recreate the world.

That's the end.

It's all downhill from here. We're not expecting any redemptive act to secure the judgment on sin or to deal with the sin issue. We're not expecting any final second phase of dealing with the sin issue.

That's all been dealt with. Look, right now, we're just mopping up the stage of human history. We're just cleaning things up. It's all gonna be resolved. Everything that led up to the consummation of the ages, the death of Christ, everything anticipated it.

It was all moving toward that. And when that happened, that was the culmination, the zenith, the climax of all of human history. And now, the rest of it is just the pieces falling into place. He's gonna gather in his elect.

He's going to take them home to be with him. He's going to judge the living and the dead. He's going to establish his kingdom and he's gonna recreate the world. All of that comes out of that one consummating act of the death of Christ in human history.

To say that it is the consummation of the ages simply is a way of saying it is the defining, the defining point of human history, the central point of human history. Everything led up to that and now everything is just coasting until it is all wrapped up.

That's good news, isn't it? When we speak about the end times, what do we typically mean? We typically, when you wonder, and if anything would make you wonder this, 2020 would make you wonder this. Are we living in the end times?

If we're not, I want to die long before the end times ever show up. Are we living in the end times? When we ask that question by end times, what we typically mean is are we living in the weeks, months, or short years prior to the return of Jesus Christ?

When the New Testament speaks of the end times, it uses the word differently, the phrase differently. Because the answer to this question, are we living in the end times? The answer to that is yes. Not that I mean that we're living in the days, weeks, months prior to the coming of Jesus.

I sure hope we are. And all God's people said, yes, please.

Right.

But that's not what I mean when I say we are living in the end times. We're living between the first advent of the Lord and the second advent of the Lord. Those are the last days. 2 ,000 years so far, but those are the last days.

Are we living in the last days? Yes, we are. We have been for 2 ,000 years. The next event. Listen, when God has gathered in all of his chosen ones, then the end is gonna come.

That's what we're waiting on.

We're just waiting for him to gather in all of his elect so that he could lose none of them as he promised in John chapter six. All that the Father gives me will come. I'll lose none of them. Maybe some of those elect haven't been born yet.

I hope that all of the elect have been born already so that we can get this over with. That's my desire. That's my longing.

Trust me.

But once he gathers in all of his elect, then that's it. So the end times is this period of time between the first coming of the Messiah and the second coming of the Messiah. We live in the messianic age.

And when he returns, that's not going to be the end of the messianic age. Because when he returns, he's going to return in judgment upon the nations. When he comes again, and he's going to establish a kingdom which will also be the messianic age.

There is no age after this. There's no post-messianic age in which the messianic issue is not an issue. Today, he is saving his people. Eventually, he is going to judge the rebellious. And then he's going to establish his kingdom which will be an everlasting kingdom.

Right now, we are living in the end times because this is the messianic age. That's how scripture speaks of it. I'll give you some examples. First Peter 1 .20. Peter said, he, Christ, was foreknown before the foundation of the world but has appeared in these last times.

Even back at the beginning of Hebrews, remember what it says? In these last days, God has spoken to us in his son. We're still in those last days, period. First Corinthians 10 .11. Now, these things happened to them, that is Old Testament saints, as an example.

And they were written for our instruction. And Paul says, we are the ones upon whom the end of the ages has come. The end of the ages has come upon New Testament saints. So yes, we're living in the last days.

That's good news. The coming of the Lord may be 1 ,000 years out. I don't see how it can be. I honestly don't see how it can be. But I'm not gonna set any dates. I hope it's not even 1 ,000 days out. So it simply means, when he talks about the consummation of the ages, that this is an end time sacrifice.

It is the last sacrifice. There's no sacrifice to be made after this. He simply means that it is the definitive act of history, the decisive point of all of human history, the zenith of God's redemptive work.

And now we're just coasting to the finish line. And it seems with ever increasing speed that we're coasting to the finish line. Because it's all gonna be wrapped up. And he's gonna deal with all of it.

Why is it the consummation? Because his death is all that was needed and no further work is necessary. There's no phase two to God dealing with the sin issue. This is what he means, and we'll get to it in a couple weeks, down in verse 28, when he says, Christ was all suffered once to bear the sins of many.

He will appear a second time, but without reference to sin, to those who eagerly await him. In other words, when he comes, it is not going to be to offer another sacrifice or to deal with sin. When he comes, it will be to bring the fullness of all the promised salvation to those who eagerly await him.

I'm looking forward to that. Third, it is a public sacrifice. A one-time sacrifice, an end-time sacrifice, and then a public sacrifice. Look what he says in verse 26. Once now at the consummation of the ages, he has been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

That word manifest means to reveal, to make visible, to make it appear, or to make something known. And I don't wanna make too much of this, but there is something to be noted here. This describes something that is public and publicly displayed, and we can contrast this with the work of the tabernacle.

For this observation, I am in debt to Charles Spurgeon and his sermon on this passage. He had an insight, and he didn't spend much time, in fact, he didn't even spend as much time talking about it as I'm about to, but I thought it was an insight that was worth sort of bringing out and giving to you today.

The work of Christ was public. The atonement that took place in the tabernacle was very secret. It was behind a veil, and nobody saw the atonement actually take place. They could see the sacrifice. They could see the high priest enter into the tabernacle with the blood, but they never actually saw the high priest apply the blood to the Ark of the Covenant.

That was something that only one person saw, the one who did it, the high priest. He was the only one allowed behind the veil. He was the only one who could see the Ark of the Covenant. He was the only one that was there when the blood was applied.

And every Jew who would watch that high priest walk behind that veil to apply the blood to the Ark of the Covenant had to believe in his heart, had faith that that high priest was going to apply the blood, and the application of that blood, the sprinkling of it on the mercy seat, would then in itself accomplish atonement.

But the actual work of atonement itself was never done in the public eye. The sacrifice was, but the application of that blood was not. Compare that to the life and ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ, where everything was public.

He was born publicly, and his birth was announced publicly by angels. He lived a public life out in the public eye, where everybody, friends, enemies, skeptics, critics, haters, and lovers of God could all see him and observe his deeds in his entire life.

His conduct was observed, so much to the point where in the Gospel of John he says, "'Which one of you can charge me with sin?'. And nobody, even those who knew him closest, even those who observed every aspect of his life, nobody could charge him with wrongdoing or sin.

He lived his life publicly. He did his miracles and his teachings publicly before crowds, before crowds of skeptics, before crowds of God-lovers and pious men, before crowds of friends, before crowds of complete strangers.

All of his, not all of his, some of his miracles were done privately, but most of his miracles were done out under the public eye, where people could scrutinize them and analyze them and see whether or not these things actually were so, and his teachings were public.

In other words, we're not putting our faith in the testimony of one or two people who were privy to somebody who lived their lives like a recluse off in the corner and did his miracles only observed by one or two people.

Everything he did from the beginning of his life to the end of his life was all public. Even his crucifixion and the sacrifice of Christ itself was as public as public could be. It was outside of the busiest city in the land of Israel, at the busiest point of the year in the land of Israel, the day of Passover, and he was crucified outside the city along the main pathway, the Damascus Road, that led right into the city through one of the main gates at a time of the day when every Jew who came to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover would have been walking into the city to observe the Passover at the temple.

Tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of people would have walked by him while he was on that cross, on that road. And the death that he died, he died out publicly under the scrutiny and observation of all the watching world.

There was nothing other than putting it on national television that the Lord could have done to display Jesus Christ more publicly than what he did. And his resurrection, unlike charismatic resurrections now, quote unquote resurrections now, that take place in some foreign field where nobody has a camera or the ability to record it, the resurrection of Jesus Christ took place publicly in front of every watching eye so that he appeared to one person, then he appeared to two people, then he appeared to 10 of his disciples, then to 11 of his disciples, then he appeared to the apostle Paul, and he appeared to over 500 people at one time, many of whom still doubted even when they saw him raised from the dead.

And the tomb, which was just right beside where he was crucified, was right along the main road leading into Jerusalem so that any Jew coming into the city on that main day of the year could have stopped by and taken a look at the empty tomb.

And all of the Romans knew it, and they bribed their people to keep it quiet. Everything about what God did in Jesus Christ was as public as public could be. We have not believed cleverly devised fables or tables, tales, I was gonna say.

Tales and fables make for tables. We have not believed cleverly devised fables. We have not believed the testimony of one or two people who saw a few things off in some remote corner of the wilderness.

We have believed in the testimony and the work of God displaying Jesus Christ publicly. This is what is meant in Romans 3 .25 when Paul says God displayed him publicly as a propitiation in his blood through faith.

Colossians 2 .15 when he, that is Christ, had disarmed the rulers and authorities, he made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through him. In Acts 26 when Paul is giving his address to King Agrippa and Festus is standing there listening to it, the ruler in Caesarea, and Paul's giving his testimony to Agrippa and he goes through the testimony of Christ being crucified and being rejected by the Jews and rising again and appearing to Paul, he lays all of that out.

Do you remember what Festus said to him? Paul, your much learning is making you mad, crazy. You're going crazy, Paul. And what was Paul's response? Paul said, I'm not out of my mind, most excellent Festus, for I utter words of sober truth, for the king knows about these matters and I speak to him also with confidence since I am persuaded that none of these things escape his notice, for this was not done in a corner.

Everybody knew. When God displayed Jesus Christ publicly to deal with the sin issue, it wasn't behind a temple veil, wasn't in a room with one other person, it was before the eyes of a watching world.

It was as public as public could be. The atonement was not finished until the blood was sprinkled on the ark and nobody got to see that. But our atonement and the cost of our sin was paid publicly out under the watching eye of all the world for everybody to see.

And skeptics, God lovers and God haters, all of them together could gaze upon that spectacle and see what God was doing in Jesus Christ in dealing with the sin issue once and for all. It was not a private sacrifice, it was a public sacrifice.