Hebrews Chapter Ten, Taking Sacrfices Away

 

Hebrews 10:8 Previously saying, “Sacrifice and offering, burnt offerings, and offerings for sin You did not desire, nor had pleasure in them” (which are offered according to the law), [9] then He said, “Behold, I have come to do Your will, O God.” He takes away the first that He may establish the second.

 

The author compounds verses 5 and 6, summarizing the multiplicity of sacrifice being considered. Again, we are confronted with the stark language that God does not desire sacrifice, and finds no pleasure in sacrifice. The writer takes pains to mention sacrifice (synonymous with offerings) four times, representing various types of offerings commanded under the Law.

Though God gave the Law to Israel, and with it the injunction to offer sacrifice, He did not find pleasure in these things. The writer tells us that previously He said as much. Using a more simplistic rendering, the NIV says of this verse, “First he said, “Sacrifices and offerings…” So the Holy Spirit acknowledges several things here. First, He does inform us that Israel was commanded to sacrifice, according to the Law on Mount Horeb. More than that, sacrifice was something that was part of Israel’s heritage since (and before) the Flood. Abel sacrificed, Genesis 4:4. Noah sacrificed, Genesis 8:20.

 

But then God’s plan became more focused. Noah was the father of Shem, the ancestor of the Semitic people. From, Shem, in due time, came Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the celebrated patriarchs of the Jewish people. You will search the Scriptures in vain to find any commandment given to the Gentile nations to perpetuate sacrifice once God began to narrow His salvation plan to Israel as a nation, and Judah’s bloodline within Israel. The people entered into a covenant with Yahweh at Sinai, ratified by the shed blood of animals. Sacrifice was the symbol or token of God atoning for man’s sin by the vicarious death of another. Yet we read in the plainest language that sacrifice didn’t please God. The soul that sacrificed because he heard God’s word and trusted Him, had his faith counted for righteousness; the sole means by which every saint since the earth’s inception has been saved. Not sacrifice, but by faith, Habakkuk 2:4.

 

Yet even with Israel receiving sacrifice as a commandment perpetuated for hundreds of years on the altar, God continued to narrow His plan. First there was the tabernacle, then Shiloh, and finally the temple built by Solomon in Jerusalem. First God chose out a people from amongst the nations. One tribe He chose as His priestly caste; they would minister to the people. Another He chose as the line of kings, whose ultimate destiny was the prophesied Messiah, the Anointed One who would rectify the calamity of the Fall and undo Adam’s sin. As Israel was taken, the place for sacrifice was defined. By one nation, through one tribe, at one geographical location, was access to the true God of creation possible. The narrow road was being revealed, and it was leading toward the foreshadowed Messiah.

 

Sacrifice, though undesired by the Lord, was a good teaching tool. It served to elucidate the idea that man’s sin must be dealt with judiciously, and that death was the vehicle that remitted sin. Sacrifice taught that God was not approachable in any way man chose. Cain learned this when he offered the fruits of the earth, only to be rejected, Genesis 4:3, 5. Nadab and Abihu likewise learned this when they offered strange fire before Yahweh, and the Lord consumed them, Leviticus 10:1, 2. “All roads lead to God,” is a vicious myth that has infiltrated our culture, deceiving even professing Christians into agreeing that Christ is but one road. But our Lord Himself told us in no uncertain terms, “I am the way and the truth and the life,” John 14:6, NIV.

 

In verse 9 we find the author telling us, “then He said.” First, our Lord has related how He does not enjoy sacrifice. Second, He says that His purpose was to do God’s will in the body God prepared for Him. By doing this latter thing, by incarnating as a Man, He has taken away the first, or the provisional commandment to the Jews to offer sacrifice, that He may establish (institute, begin, found) the second. How? “But now, once at the end of the ages, He has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself,” Hebrews 9:26. The next verse, which we will discuss shortly, agrees. “By that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all,” Hebrews 10:10.

 

Christ put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. Note the singular. Sin, not sins. Of the various translations I own, including the NLT, every one renders this passage in the singular. The Greek word is “hamartia,” and can be translated, “missing the mark. It is a moral deviation, or an inward element that produces action.” Sins are the manifestation of sin, or mankind’s sin nature, inherited from Adam. Christ did not come to cure us of sins, but to save us from sin itself, by having it put to death with Him on the cross. Those who are Christ’s have been cleansed of sin. It is the difference between a cold medicine that quiets symptoms (sacrifice/works), and a medicine that eliminates the germ that caused the symptoms, eradicating the manifestation by rooting out its attendant cause (Jesus’ death on the cross in payment for our sins). This is what our Lord established by His death. No more sacrifice is necessary. In fact, it is grossly insulting, as we will soon learn later in this chapter, God willing.