God comforts us by the oath He made to Christ, appointing Him our high priest forever.
Hebrews reminds its Jewish readers that the old Mosaic covenant was also dedicated and sealed by the blood of sacrifice. But under the old covenant, there was no promise of the forgiveness of sin. Rather, the blood bore witness against the people when they broke the covenant, and pictured judgment and wrath against their sin.
But when Christ died to carry out His New Covenant promises to the heirs, His blood of the New Testament was for the forgiveness of sins!
Aaronic priests offered sacrifices to make a temporal atonement for sin. Hebrews then makes this declaration: without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness, or remission, of sin.
The reason for this is that, since before the fall of Adam, God had promised death and judgment to all who sin against Him.
In the sacrificial system, God provided a picture that pointed to Christ as the only real sacrifice that takes away sin. Those animal sacrifices pointed to Jesus as our substitute in the judgment.
Part of this picture depends upon the importance God placed on protecting the blood of animals from common usage. Men were prohibited from eating the blood, and it could only be used as a sacrifice to God.
God explains to us why: "I have given you the blood to make atonement for your souls."
Because the blood is the life of the creature, that blood shedding of a sacrifice to God satisfies, at least temporally, and metaphorically, the just demand of God for death as the punishment for crimes against Him.
No wonder our Lord Jesus offered His shed blood – His very life – for the forgiveness of sins that He promised to us.
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John Pittman Hey was born in 1961 in Jackson, Mississippi, to Godly parents who from the beginning raised him in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. With child-like faith he came to Christ on his fourth birthday at his mother's knee. He received his education at church...
