1 The law is only a
shadow of the good things that are coming--not the realities
themselves. For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated
endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship.
2 If it could, would
they not have stopped being offered? For the worshipers would have been
cleansed once for all, and would no longer have felt guilty for their sins.
3 But those
sacrifices are an annual reminder of sins,
4 because it is
impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.
5 Therefore, when
Christ came into the world, he said: "Sacrifice and offering you did
not desire, but a body you prepared for me;
6 with burnt
offerings and sin offerings you were not pleased.
9 Then he said,
"Here I am, I have come to do your will." He sets aside the
first to establish the second.
10 And by that will,
we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus
Christ once for all. [NIV]
The Law God gave to Moses and the Israelites in the Old
Testament was given to lead people to God, never to save them. The writer of
Hebrews said this and Jesus confirmed it in these verses.
Hebrews 10 says the same sacrifices offered endlessly year after
year cannot make a person perfect (sin free). If it did make a person perfect
and sin free, then there would be no need for sacrifice after sacrifice. A
person’s guilt is not wiped away with ritual sacrifices, nor is their sin.
Those sacrifices of the Old Testament were just reminders of sin.
Jesus said, “With burnt offerings and sin offerings you were not
pleased.” Therefore, The Father created a body for His Son to indwell and sacrifice.
He was the perfect sacrifice that lasts forever, because the Son rose from the
dead to be alive again. So His sacrifice for sins lasts, because He is part of
the everlasting Godhead.
Jesus said this in verse nine when He said, “Behold I have come
to do your will.” It was God’s will to provide a better sacrifice than that of
bulls and goats that had to be sacrifices over and over. He provided the
ultimate and perfect sacrifice, the life of His Son, Jesus Christ, whose sacrifice
lasts forever because He rose from the grave to live forever. Because of that,
His sacrifice covers all sin for all time.
From this, we learn we cannot provide the sacrifice to cover and
take away our sins. Our sacrifices would be finite. So, we can do nothing to be
cleansed from our sins. What we can do is accept by faith the grace God offers
to us by His love and through Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection. We cannot
save ourselves from sin and death, but Jesus can and did. You have only to
accept it by faith.
And what is faith? “Faith is the assurance of things hoped for
and the conviction of things not seen.” [Hebrews 11:1]
Will you believe and stop striving to save yourself?
