Hebrews Chapter Ten, Displeasure In Sacrifice

 

Hebrews 10:5 Therefore, when He came into the world, He said: “Sacrifice and offering You did not desire, but a body You have prepared for Me. [6] In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin you had no pleasure. [7] Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come—in the volume of the book it is written of Me—to do Your will, O God.’”

 

Chapter 10 is contending with the futility of sacrifice and its hopeless repetition. The Law commanded sacrifice, but this passage, quoted out of Psalm 40:6-8, reveals the heart of God. He does not desire sacrifice. So, it is not the act of sacrifice that benefited the Jewish worshiper. Rather, it was the spirit behind it, the motivation that empowered the worshiper’s decision to obey.

Remaining on topic, however, let us turn our attention to this passage in Hebrews. Of course, the “He” who came and spoke in verse 5 is Jesus our Lord. The Son reveals the will of the Father, expressing that sacrifice is not something that interests God. Sacrifice can be done by rote, negating any point to its act. Religious formality is a stagnant pool left alone. Have you seen the calm, sunken waters of a swamp? The water, never troubled by invading outlets, stagnates and becomes covered in pond scum. It is murky and filthy, unfit for consumption or any use of benefit to others. So it is with religious formality. That is why, in the OT, the prophets always decry offerings void of obedience born of faith.

 

The latter portion of verse 5 is quoted, not from the Masoretic Text, but from the Septuagint: the Greek translation of the Old Testament. In case someone is curious why the writer appears to quote something incongruent with the Old Testament in Bibles that follow the Masoretic Text, that is why. The KJV version renders the verse: “mine ears hast thou opened.”

 

This reference reaches back to Exodus, chapter 21, dealing with slaves that willingly remain with their masters. When a slave volunteers to remain in service to his master, the Law stipulated a public act to demonstrate that the man in question was voluntarily entering into a servant role for his entire life. We read, “Then his master shall bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an aul; and he shall serve him forever,” Exodus 21:6, KJV.

 

The mention of opening the ear has nothing to do with making someone capable of listening; rather, it is the symbol of a lifelong covenant between master and servant. To paraphrase, the Psalmist could have said, “You have made Me Your bondservant.” Tying together the variant translations with this correlation, we return to the Septuagint’s rendering. We read in Philippians that Jesus, “made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant,” Philippians 2:7. The Masoretic text suggests that the individual in view is voluntarily made subject to the One who does not desire sacrifice and offering. The Septuagint implies that a body is prepared for service to God, “to do Your will, O God, verse 7.

 

The context of the Psalm, if one were to read on, confirms this concept. “I have preached righteousness in the great congregation…I have not hid thy truth within my heart, and I have declared thy salvation; I have not hid thy mercy and thy truth from the great congregation,” Psalm 40:9, 10, LXX.

 

Verse 6 reinforces the prior verse more emphatically. The Psalmist explains, not only does God not desire sacrifice, but He has no pleasure in it. Then what of the verse that states, “Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief,” Isaiah 53:10? Did the Father delight in putting the Son to grief? No. God the Father, like God the Son, saw the labor of His soul, and was satisfied, Isaiah 53:11. The punishment inflicted was not God’s pleasure; God does not derive pleasure from sacrifice. What He does derive pleasure from, however, is obedience spawned from love. Christ loves the Father, and while on earth demonstrated that love by perfect, unswerving obedience, even unto death. The Father was pleased because “the suffering of death” would be followed by Christ “crowned with glory and honor,” Hebrews 2:9.

 

Again and again, religious sacrifice, offerings, or works, is challenged by Scripture at every turn. Works salvation is fraught with fear, uncertainty, and despair. Cardinal O’Connor of New York went on record years ago, stating that neither he, nor Pope John Paul II, or Mother Teresa, or any Roman Catholic authority could know with certainty what their eternal destiny was. When your religion is balanced upon the lynchpin of perpetual sacrifice, rather than the sure knowledge of Scripture’s promises, this is the result. It is a small wonder God did not desire or take pleasure in sacrifice. The only work God gave His followers to do was to believe in Jesus, John 6:29. If we trust, rather than work, we have (present tense) eternal life, John 6:27, 35, 37, 40, 47, 51, 58, etc.

 

Oxford defines “behold” simply as to “see or observe.” The Greek word for “ behold,” (Lo in the KJV), is “idou.” The word is an imperative mood, a middle voice. A middle voice in the complex language of Greek is defined as “the subject is both an agent of an action, and somehow concerned with the action.” In this instance it would seem that, Christ is the object to be noticed (Behold), and the agency involved with the event (I have come).

 

The Psalmist states that, in the volume of the book it is written of the Coming One. What book? While at this point, the Old Testament, up to and including David’s own writings, since he is the human author of Psalm 40, which we are considering. The promise of a Savior was given almost the instant Adam sinned, Genesis 3:15. Jacob foresaw Him on his deathbed, and foretold that His lineage would spring from Judah, the lawgiver, Genesis 49:10. Balaam the prophet foresaw the Coming One as a Star and a Scepter in language reminiscent to Jacob’s from Genesis, Numbers 24:17-19. Moses foretold of a Prophet like him that would arise from Israel’s midst, and that whoever would not hearken to the Prophet would be cut off, Deuteronomy 18:15, 18, 19. I find it interesting how Moses is inspired to liken the coming Prophet to himself, and later, in Hebrews, we find the author eliciting the same comparison, Hebrews 3:2, undoubtedly thinking about this self-same passage.

 

I will refrain from traversing the whole of the Old Testament. I believe these citations are sufficient to prove the writer’s point, having all come from the writings of Moses. Not even the Sadducees would find ground to complain, since they only accepted the writings of Moses as authoritative, and Moses wrote of Him numerous times. There are dozens of prophecies in the OT concerning the coming of Jesus Christ. It is a potent tool in the arsenal of evangelism, to demonstrate the veracity of the Bible for someone willing to listen. Of course, for the unwilling, no amount of plausible evidence, however convincing, will move them from their place, because they are convinced, not by reason, but by a hardened heart that does not want to surrender its moral government to the Lawgiver.

 

Lastly, we learn why Jesus came. It is beautifully, elegantly, simple. Our Lord came to do the Father’s will. The Psalmist writes that His purpose was to declare salvation to the assembly, first to Israel, and then to the world, Isaiah 9:1, 2, 49:5, 6. God’s will was to offer Christ as the Lamb of God to take away the sin of the world, John 1:29, Revelation 13:8, 2 Timothy 1:9, Titus, 1:2. Like Abraham offered Isaac, seemingly a willing sacrifice in service to the God they served, the Father made Christ an offering for sin, for our sake, and it was to our Lord’s glory that He came not to do His own will, but to do the will of the Father. Jesus worded it succinctly when He said, “the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many,” Matthew 20:28. Christ admitted that He came to serve. Serve whom? His Father, of course, as our current verse, and Psalm 40 attest to. How will His service end? It culminates, in Jesus’ own words, when He gives His life as a ransom for many, a euphemism in Scripture that often conveys the idea of everyone.