The Better Blood of the Better Sacrifice Brought into the True Tabernacle

Forgiveness of sins and eternal life are two key benefits derived from the blood atonement achieved in the better sacrifice offered by Jesus Christ at the cross of Calvary (Heb 9:23). The incarnate Son of God (Jn 1:14), our great high priest (Heb 4:14), shed His own precious blood on the cursed tree (Gal 3:13; 1 Pet 1:19), on which He was hanging at the hands of both godless Jews and Gentiles (Acts 2:23).

Sin pollutes everything (Rom 8:21; Gal 6:8); therefore, both ceremonial (external) and moral (internal) guilt requires cleansing by life blood. Without the blood of an acceptable substitute (Lev 16; Is 53), there is no forgiveness of lawless thoughts, words, and actions (Heb 9:22). Even inherited sin (original sin) from Adam must be expiated (Gen 3; Ps 51:5; Rom 5:12). Although sacrifices were offered from the time of the giving of the Law of God through Moses on Mount Sinai, there was no permanent solution to the sin problem experienced by all of God’s chosen people (Rom 3:23; 5:12; 6:23). The promise of the new covenant was to remedy this deficiency with a final, permanent solution with eternal effects (Jer 31:31–34).

Ethnic Israel was in the Promised Land from 1406 B.C. The holy city Jerusalem was secured. The site of the holy Temple, the threshing floor of Araunah, was purchased by King David (2 Sam 24:16–24). The temple, including the holy sanctuary was built by King Solomon (966 B.C). Sacrifice for sins were made through all of this history by the sons of Aaron, from the priestly tribe of Levi, as ordered by Yahweh in the Law (Ex 24). We must remember these were all types and shadows of the heavenly reality.

When the mediator of the new and better covenant presented Himself as a priest in the order of Melchizedek (Gen 14:18; Ps 110:4–6; Heb 9:15; 12:24), He entered the true tabernacle in heaven (Heb 9:24). There, as our great high priest who offered Himself to God (Heb 7:27; 9:14), Jesus Christ presented His own blood of His one-time, once for all the sins of all those people given to Him before the foundation of the world (Jn 17:2, 6, 24; 2 Tim 1:9; Heb 7:27; 9:26, 28; 10:10). The blood of Christ remains forever on the mercy seat of heaven, which is the throne of God’s mercy and grace (Heb 4:16; 9:16).

With Jesus’ one-time offering of His body, as the sin bearer of God’s elect (Heb 9:26; 1 Pet 2:24), an eternal redemption was finished (Heb 9:12), never to be repeated. This is why the writer of Hebrews employs the adjective “better” to the substitutionary sacrifice of Christ (Heb 9:23).

Jesus’ blood has released God’s elect, redeemed people from their sins (Rev 1:5). It has reconciled us to God (Rom 5:10). It has cancelled our entire debt of sin (Col 2:14). It has propitiated the righteous wrath of God against us as sinners (Rom 3:25; Heb 2:17; 1 Jn 2:2; 4:10). It has justified the members of Christ’s church before the holy God (1 Pet 3:18). It has put away sin (Heb 9:26). It has removed all condemnation (Rom 8:1). It has destroyed sin’s dominion (Rom 6:14).

Apart from Christ, the natural man is dead in sin and simply biding his time until the death of his body (Rom 3:23; 6:23; Eph 2:1). This is followed by the righteous judgment of God and its eternal effect — eternal punishment in the torment of fiery hell (Mt 25:41, 46; 2 Cor 5:10; Heb 9:27; Jude 7; Rev 20:11, 14–15).

The blood of Jesus, God’s only begotten Son, cleanses us from all sin (Jn 3:16; 1 Jn 1:7). The shed blood of the unblemished Lamb of God was poured out as a ransom paid for many (Mt 20:28; 26:28; Mk 10:45; 14:24; Jn 1:29). The “many” are gathered from every nation as members of the body of Christ, His church, His one holy nation, the Israel of God (Gal 6:16; 1 Pet 2:9; Rev 5:9; 7:9). We who were far from God have been bought near by the blood of Christ (Eph 2:13). He Himself is our peace with God and with others (Eph 2:14–15). It was the blood of His cross that secured this peace (Col 1:20).

The blood of the eternal covenant which speaks better than the blood of Abel and all other sacrifices offered to God, is applied to God’s chosen people by the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit (Heb 10:29; 12:24; 13:12, 20; 1 Pet 1:2). When the Spirit sprinkles the blood of the new, better, and eternal covenant upon elect souls, it sets the regenerate soul free from bondage to sin (Jn 3:1–8; 8:32, 36; Rom 6:6; Heb 13:20). The slave of Christ, a man made new, now walks in newness of life (Rom 6:4; Eph 6:6), experiencing daily renewal in the Spirit (2 Cor 4:16; Titus 3:5).

Those purchased by and washed in the blood of the Lamb are both morally and ceremonially clean from the point of regeneration and justification (Acts 20:28). Their legal standing (righteousness) never changes, despite their sinning to a somewhat lesser degree, as those who now live the victorious life of faith in Christ (1 Jn 5:4), by the power and direction of His indwelling Spirit (Jn 14:17; Rom 8:9, 11), who never leaves nor forsakes us (Heb 13:5).

The glorious appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ is for a different purpose than His first advent. Holy Spirit-filled believers in Christ are those who eagerly await Him (Mt 25; Heb 9:28). The second coming of Christ pertains to salvation without reference to sin. Sin, death, judgment, and punishment no longer inflict fear upon the children of God. New life in Christ is abundant life (Jn 10:10; 2 Cor 5:17). It is the dawning of eternal life in our souls (1 Jn 5:11–13).

The life of God in the souls of saved sinners has a daily renewing power to cleanse the conscience of guilt and shame (Heb 9:14). Our God remembers our sins no more (Jer 31:34; Heb 8:12), having cast it away to the depths of the sea (Mic 7:19). Freedom in Christ is freedom from slavery to sin and the devil (Gal 5:1). Walking by faith in the power of the Spirit manifests the transformation of a sinner to becoming a saint (Rom 12:1–3; Gal 5:16, 25).

Saints are God’s holy ones, set apart by God for service and worship. We wait patiently for the return of our great high priest, who is our Forerunner into the holiest place of heaven (Heb 6:20). Just as the Old Testament high priest returned from the holiest of holies in the sanctuary, so our great high priest will soon return for His redeemed regenerate people, in order to complete our salvation, by raising us from the dead at His coming (Jn 5:28–29; 1 Thess 4:13–5:11; Rev 19:11–21).

On the last day, as Christ returns with His holy angels and the souls of His saints who died in Christ (Mk 8:38; 1 Thess 3:13; 2 Thess 1:10), He will shout for His own to arise from the dust of our tombs (1 Thess 4:16), to receive glorified bodies, to be united to our glorified souls, and to be caught up together with Him in the air. We will see our Savior and Lord; and we will be like Him (1 Jn 3:2) — prepared for an eternal future in His glorious presence, holy and blameless in the new heavens and the new earth of the new creation (Is 65–66; Eph 1:4; 5:23; Col 1:22; Rev 21–22).

David Norczyk

Coeur d’Alene, Idaho

February 3, 2024

Hebrews 9:23–28