Hebrews 7 - Once for all

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Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the

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Apostle Paul said, But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

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In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you.

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By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her

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King. Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry.

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My name is Mike Abendroth, and I was just going to do two shows and then go, but I realized my wife is gone.

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My daughter is gone. My other daughter is gone. My other son and daughter in California, and it's 20 to 5, and I could go home, but there's nobody home.

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It's just the dog. So, instead of coming back tomorrow to do one more show, because I need to do four shows a week,

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I've got three done, I'm just going to do another one right now, because I'm thinking about Hebrews chapter 7 in my sermon on Sunday, so if I talk about that out loud, then

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I can write off the time. If you're watching, if you're part of the

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Facebook group, welcome. I think I tricked you, because I said I was just going to do two shows, but there's three.

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Maybe Wendy's drinking Diet Coke. I had to go get some seltzer water. This is mandarin.

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I'm sure these flavors say natural, but they've been made in some factory in Jersey.

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Someone on Twitter said, I don't like it when people are on podcasts and they drink water or any liquids.

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Don't touch wet paint. I think we're going to have our

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Scott Clark here in the fall for a conference at Bethlehem Bible Church. If you're in New England, you ought to attend.

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I think that's going to be October 11th and 12th, so I'm excited about that.

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Scott's a good friend and a theological wizard. That's what I'm going to start calling him. The theological wizard.

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How shiny can a person's head be? That's the question. I think it's just the lights. This is like,

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I feel like I'm Rajon Rondo or something. People wearing headbands. Why do people wear headbands when they play basketball?

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I have no idea. Maybe if you were bald, you would know. You can write me, Mike, at NoCompromiseRadio .com.

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For those of you that ask about my health, thank you for that. Thank you for praying for me. If you have prayed for me, I feel good.

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The numbers are good. I'll probably die of something else. So, there you go.

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My knee's killing me, though. Can you imagine if you are like me?

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Let's say your back hurts. My back is especially hurt today. Or your knee, your neck, something like that.

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Or of course, you could be in a lot worse situations, and some of our listeners are, I know. And what if you had to live 969 years in that body that was breaking down?

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I think about 80, and then glory. That's going to be just about right. Of course,

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I have no say in that. I might live to be 90. I might live to be 58.

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I'm 58 right now. Almost 59. And if you listen to No Compromise Radio, and you don't get any of the pop culture references, you know why.

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That means you're too young. I've been talking about the Lord Jesus in Hebrews chapter 7. What I try to do on the show is

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I try to talk about a bunch of things so you think about them biblically. It matters not what you think.

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It matters not what I think. It matters not this, that, or the other in terms of who

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God is. It matters what the Bible says. And then

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I wrap my mind around that thought. In other words, yeah, it matters what you think because it's important what you believe.

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But you don't determine truth, and democracy doesn't determine truth. God does, and He reveals

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His truth about Himself generally in nature and creation, and then specifically in His Word.

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And so we want to try to study the Bible. We're people of the book. And people say, well, you know, you just love the

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Bible, and you just worship the Bible. It's very interesting when people say that. I actually like it when they say it because I think to some degree they understand what we're doing.

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Anyway, God's Word is what we study because it is from Him, and we study

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His triune work. And I guess that's my intro. Hebrews 7 .27, He has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for His own sins and then for the sins of the people.

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What's happening is the writer wants you to think, whatever my system might be before I became saved,

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Jesus is better, right? That's the idea of Hebrews, better, better, better, better, better. And not good, better, best, with better meaning in the middle.

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But it's good, better. It was adequate, or rather inadequate.

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This one's adequate. And he says basically what happens with priests back in the old days, they had to offer sacrifices, first for their own sins, then for the sins of the people.

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So as Wendy said, I think it was Wendy, she's been studying Leviticus, listen to what Leviticus says about offering sins for Himself first, then

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He can offer sins for the people. And this is, when you hear this, you're going to be thinking, yep, but that's not what

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Jesus did. That's not how Jesus does it. And that's the point, because Jesus doesn't have any sins, right? He's perfectly righteous, and when

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He's born of a woman, born under law, He's earning righteousness for other people. He's already righteous.

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He doesn't need to earn it for Himself. Leviticus 4, if the anointed priest sins so as to bring guilt on the people, then let him offer to the

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Lord a bull without defect as a sin offering for the sin he has committed. And he shall bring the bull to the doorway of the tent of meeting before the

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Lord, and he shall lay his hand on the head of the bull and slay the bull before the Lord.

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And so, see the identification? Here's laying on of hands, I'm identifying with my sins transferred, as it were, to the head of the bull.

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Then the anointed priest is to take some of the blood of the bull and bring it to the tent of meeting, and the priest shall dip his finger in the blood and sprinkle some of the blood seven times before the

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Lord in the front of the veil of the sanctuary. The priest shall also put some of the blood on the horns of the altar of the fragrant incense, which is before the

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Lord in the tent of meeting. And the blood of the bull he shall pour out at the base of the altar of the burnt offering, which is at the doorway of the tent of meaning, meaning, the tent of meaning.

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This is a special tent. We don't know what that tent over there means. This tent, we have the special tent of meaning.

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Anyway, he sinned, so he'd have to make sacrifice for his own sin first before he was a clean vessel to be used by the

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Lord for sacrificing sins for the other people. And that's what that liturgical priest did, one after another after another.

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I think Josephus even said, something like 83 priests between Aaron and the time of Jesus's life, one after another after another, and they all were sinful.

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How do we know they were all sinful? Well, because they've all been affected by satan. Maybe I shouldn't have recorded this last show.

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Okay. When you don't know what to do, you have to have the mini

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Jesus. Put a little faith in your pocket with Jesus. I don't think that was really

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Jesus, so I'm not breaking any commandments. That's Mary. Looks like Mary. On the other hand, since he did this once for all when he offered up himself, all the ritual, all the sacrifice, they were basically butchers, but Jesus once and for all when he offered up himself.

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And as I said last time on the show, you've got to figure out how to bring these unwilling animals to be sacrificed.

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And you can kind of, even if you go to a stockyard today where animals are getting killed, there's a sense, there's a panic.

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They start to figure out what's going on, and then it's too late. But here

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Jesus offers up himself. So everything about this is different. These high priests are different in every way, shape, or form, and some of our listeners are reading through Leviticus.

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It is so helpful to read Leviticus so then you can understand the book of Hebrews. Jesus is the perfect one.

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He is the sinless one. He is the one that offers sacrifices for others and not himself.

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And even that word offered, if you see there in your Bibles, Hebrews 7 .27, offered up himself.

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That's the word that means to put up on an altar. It means to place on an altar.

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You hear this language later in the book of Hebrews, Hebrews 9 .12, he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves, but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.

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Of course, as you hear the word blood, you ought not to be thinking about corpuscles and white blood cells and red blood cells and all the hemoglobin and everything else, and Jesus could just bleed but didn't have to die.

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You should be thinking of a vicious death that included blood. That's true. But this is not just bloodletting.

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This is not Omega Man and Charlton Heston where blood comes out and you get some of the blood and you can be healed.

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This is a sacrificial death. This is offered up as a sacrifice, and of course those animals died, and the wages of sin is death, and therefore

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Jesus had to die. Hebrews 10, it sounds just like Hebrews 9 and Hebrews 7, and by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

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And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices which can never take away sins.

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Now you see the comparison, verse 12 of Hebrews 10, but when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, what did he do?

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He sat down, works done, at the right hand of God. There's no chair in the temple.

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There's no couch in the temple. There's no futon in the temple. There's no lounging area in the temple because the next person's coming in.

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The next sacrifice has to be done, but Jesus sits down at that special place of honor, waiting from that time until his enemy should be made a footstool for his feet.

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For a single sacrifice, or by a single offering, he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.

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Boy, that doesn't sound like Aaron's kind of priesthood at all, does it? No. That's an obsolete.

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That was built in to teach them something about with types and shadows and patterns and everything else, but that is not going to be the definitive sacrifice.

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That's not going to be the final sacrifice. That's not going to be the perfect sacrifice.

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Everybody else offers sacrifice daily, but here, Jesus, once and for all.

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Now, by the way, there is an argument in this verse in Hebrews 7, 27, what do you mean daily?

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This is obviously the day of atonement, and he didn't have to every day offer.

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He's talking about the day of atonement, that once for the whole year atonement that the high priest would have to do.

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The first thing you have to do is you have to say to yourself, you know what? I think the author of Hebrews knew about the day of atonement.

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I think he understood. I think he understood Leviticus. I think he was aware of the differences between annual sacrifices on the day of atonement and daily offerings of ordinary priests.

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I'm quite sure that this man could understand that and did understand it.

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What most likely is happening, he's just fusing these concepts together, because he's trying to show

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Jesus once for all. These other priests, we could say it with this kind of language, day after day after day after day, right?

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Another day, another dollar, and if you're a priest, it's another day, another dollar. I've got to tell you this story.

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I went to a basketball game here in Massachusetts, and I was rooting for a young lady who was attending the church, and she's my daughter's friend, so high school girls basketball,

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Central Mass. I had to sit with the visitor's people.

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This was a small gym, wasn't even 90 -some feet, it was 80 -something feet long, and there was like three risers on the bleacher on each side, so it wasn't a huge, big gym.

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It was small. I'm sitting with the opposing team. The people were mad at some of the refs' calls, and I thought the refs actually did a good job.

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It doesn't matter to me, really, who wins. I wanted my friend's team to win, but it wasn't that big a deal.

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What was happening was, the people were shouting mean things to the ref, and saying things about the ref, and finally the ref came over and said, that's enough, and he particularly looked at one lady and said, you keep that up, you're out.

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I thought, I want to meet you, man, that is a great referee. Anyway, sitting right by me walked this guy with all black on, but he had a little white collar right here, a little kind of like a ...

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It wasn't Perry Ellis, it was something else. I go, okay.

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He was yelling, and at the end of the first half, he got up and said, the referees are so awful, this game is disgusting,

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I protest, and he stormed off. Well, I'm in the front row.

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He walked past me, and I'm dressed like this, maybe I even have this shirt on, I don't know. See what happens when your wife goes out of town, you just wear the same stuff every day.

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It's kind of warm, that's why I like to wear this, but I think the T -shirt, the T -shirt is a different T -shirt, and it was last week.

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The guy walks past me, the priest, and I said underneath my breast, underneath my breast, underneath my breath,

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I said, man of the cloth. Loud enough that he could hear it.

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Man of the cloth. Now, I have said some things at different basketball games and other games that I probably shouldn't have, and my wife's elbow hit me in the ribs, and I realized, oh, you know what,

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I better be careful. Anyway, man of the cloth. Those men of the cloth back in the days of Leviticus, it's just everyday sacrifice.

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Sacrifice, after sacrifice, after sacrifice, after sacrifice, daily. That's the idea. I think he's fusing, as one commentator said, he's kind of fusing the

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Day of Atonement with all the other sacrifices. I think that's just how he's talking. It's a sermon that he's preaching.

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Hebrews is a sermon epistle, an epistle sermon, sermonic epistle, an epistlatory sermon. That's what it is.

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And so he's contrasting what Jesus did with what they do. And Levitical priests, one after another, after another, after another.

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Exodus 29, 38, it does say, one lamb you shall offer in the morning, and the other lamb you shall offer at twilight.

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So there are daily sacrifices, and then there's the one sacrifice on the Day of Atonement, and then you've got the scapegoat, et cetera.

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But that's not how Jesus does it. He does it once for all when he offers up himself, right?

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He was the willing one who did this. He laid down his life so that he could take it back up again, John chapter 10.

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This language of Jesus is found in first Peter chapter two, at least the idea, he himself bore our sins in his body on the tree that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.

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By his wounds, you have been healed. Could any priest, here's the point, here's the drum roll.

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Could any priest die for his own sins and for the sins of others?

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Well, he'd have to die for his own. He couldn't die for the sins of others. He couldn't be representative for them because he had his own sins to pay for, but Christ bears the sins of others because he didn't have any sins, so therefore he could.

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He's different than earthly priests. He's in contrast to earthly priests. He is with finality, with definitive sacrifice paid for every sin that would ever be committed by every person who had ever lived that put their faith in Christ.

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Is that right? Is that right? We're talking about what kind of atonement, definite atonement, particular atonement for all those who'd ever believe he paid for all their sins.

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Now God had told the Israelites to offer sacrifices, substitutes, but Jesus is the substitute.

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That's why regularly Christian, if you're listening today or watching, you ought to talk about Jesus as representative and substitute and risen savior.

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That's how you should talk about him. He was our representative. He was our substitute. He is the risen savior once for all.

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Now, by the way, think for a second. This is important. If this is once for all and done, what does that mean about all the

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Levitical sacrifices, all the Aaronic sacrifices, all the sacrifices in the Old Testament? If this is one and done, that means that is kaput.

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That is over. That is done. No more to be repeated. No more to be offered.

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The old system is done. The old system was inadequate. The old system is over.

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Christ gives himself for us that he might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify us.

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You should think about uniqueness. You should think about unrepeatable. You should think about Jesus on the cross saying it has begun.

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No, he says, just like when he said it is finished, paid in full once for all.

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Spurgeon writes this, oh, this makes the sacrifice of Christ so blessed and glorious. They dragged the bullocks and they drove the sheep to the altar.

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They bound the calves with cords, even with cords to the altar's horn. But not so was it with the

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Christ of God. None did compel him to die. He laid down his life voluntarily for he had power to lay it down and to take it up again.

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So far as Christ has himself alone concerned, there was no necessity that he should die. He was infinitely glorious and blessed.

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He offered up himself, but not for himself. Then for whom did he die? For men.

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We are told that he took not up angels, but he took up the seed of Abraham. He took up sinful men.

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Christian, Jesus did that for you. I mean, he did it in spite of you, not because of you, right?

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This whole thing, you know, he loved you so much because of who you were and what could you could offer.

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No, no. He died for the ungodly, right? He justifies the ungodly.

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And here we have the priest of the Old Testament. They can't bear other people's sins. They just offer these sacrifices, but the

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Lord bears the sins of many. He bore our sins on his body on the tree that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.

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Wendy just said, thank you, Lord Jesus. I mean, can you imagine? We deep down know what we've done. We deep down know the skeletons in our closet, and we know the things that we've done with our minds, the things that we've done with our hands, the things we've done with our bodies, and we know what

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God requires. And what we have done, every one of us, whether it's self -righteousness or unrighteousness, what we have done against God in his holiness deserves eternal punishment.

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It deserves to be crucified, naked forever, and have the wrath of God poured out on us.

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That's what we deserve. And yet the Lord took it. It just didn't happen to him. He ordained it all.

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He orchestrated it all. Before Genesis 1 -1, the triune God existed, and the

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Father and the Son had a perfect plan, a covenant, a pact, pactum salutis, a covenant of peace to go rescue the elect and the

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Spirit of God. He was there, and he was going to apply that work of Christ to those elect people.

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It was all planned in eternity past. I like to have my mind blown by thinking about eternity future, heaven, and the glories of heaven, and who's in heaven.

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I mean, the Lord Jesus, and then I'll think about seeing my mom after that, and then my wife, and other people.

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I know I should have said my wife first, but that's the point of just thinking about my mom the other day. But my mind is blown thinking about eternity past as well.

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Can you imagine? Eternity past, eternity future, all designed by God.

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It's an amazing thing. God, the Son, is the

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Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. And then he gives a conclusion in verse 28,

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For the law appoints men in their weakness as high priests, but the word of the oath, which came later than the law, appoints a son who has been made perfect forever.

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So we have a law, Levitical law, it appoints priests, right? You need to be a Levitical priest,

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Aaronic priest to be a priest. There's a law for this. And of course, Jesus wasn't a

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Levitical priest. Jesus didn't come from Levi. He came from the tribe of Judah.

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But there's another way to be a priest. And here the text says, but the word of the oath, and that's the oath talked about earlier in the chapter.

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And he comes from the Melchizedekian order, which came later than the law because Melchizedek, Psalm 110, is later than Exodus 28 and other chapters, and it appoints a son who has been made perfect forever.

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So if you had to pick a priest, who would you pick? Somebody to represent you before God. You're going to die one day.

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That's true. And you need to have a go -between. You need to have an intercessor. You need to have somebody to represent you. Who would you pick?

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Would you pick me? There's no hope for you, bro. Would you pick your

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Roman Catholic priest? Are you serious? Would you pick your favorite celebrity preacher?

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Would you pick an angel? Would you pick...

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Who would you pick? Well, I'll tell you who you'd pick. You'd pick somebody wrong. You'd pick

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Satan. That's who Eve picked. That's who Adam picked. They wanted a prophet, priest, and king, and his name was

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Satan. He said the wrong words. He is the wrong mediator, and he's the wrong ruler of this world.

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That's who we'd pick. It goes back to the idea where you meet people, and why do certain girls pick these loser boyfriends and these renegade boyfriends and these rebellious boyfriends?

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Why do certain men pick girls to be their girlfriend who are bad?

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We pick poorly. We pick wrongly. That's why God had to pick the mediator for you, and that's why you have an advocate.

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That's why you have a mediator, and that's why Martin Luther said, Christian, these words ought to be painted with gold on your heart.

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1 John 2, verse 1, about the righteous advocate.

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If you sin, friend, you've got an advocate, the one that God picked for you.

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I'm so thankful for that. I would have not picked properly. I would have not picked rightly, and you think about that old

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Indiana Jones deal. It's like he chose poorly.

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Out of any choice in all your life, this one has the eternal consequences, eternal.

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I went to a Boston Celtics game two nights ago. I said to Gracie, my daughter, 17 -year -old, I said, you know what? Every person in this entire arena,

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TD Bank, TD Garden, they all have souls, and unless their sins are forgiven by the mediator, the holy mediator, the blameless mediator, the innocent mediator, the separated from sinners mediator, the mediator who's exalted above the heavens, the mediator who once for all dies, who lays down his life, who raises it up again, that we trust in him.

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Unless people believe in that mediator, they're going to go to hell forever, and they're going to have their own mediator, themselves, somebody else,

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Satan, and it is drastic. That's why we have to tell people the good news. Friend, I have good news for you.

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You can be forgiven. There's a great mediator that God has provided for you. You need to trust in him. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Ebendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible -teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life -transforming power of God's Word through verse -by -verse exposition of the sacred text.

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Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston.

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You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.