BLESSED EXHORTATIONS (PART 9)

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

We have an altar from which those who minister at the tabernacle have no right to eat.

The high priest carries the blood of animals into the Most Holy Place as a sin offering, but the bodies are burned outside the camp. And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through His own blood. Let us, then, go to Him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace He bore.

Hebrews 13:10-13

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

Before Jesus came, atonement from sin happened through sacrifices prescribed by God and carried out by the Levites, those who were in the line of Aaron, the brother of Moses. The animals were required to be defect-free and it was the blood of the animal spread on the altar that resulted in the cleansing of transgressions. God said so Himself through words found in the Book of Leviticus and then repeated in this New Testament letter to the Hebrews that we have been studying:

“For the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one’s life.” Leviticus 17:11 (Hebrews 9:22)

When Jesus was crucified outside the city of Jerusalem, the altar shifted to the cross. It was there that the final atoning sacrifice ever needed was carried out, the perfect Lamb of God shedding His blood to take away the sin of the world (John 1:29). It was an altar that those who ministered in the temple’s tabernacle had no benefits at because they had not placed their belief in Jesus.

Conversely, those who look to the cross, place their belief in Jesus, and then take up their own crosses and follow Him, first becoming holy children of the God Most High and then co-heirs with Christ in regard to the inheritance to the very Kingdom of God (aka Heaven).

As the old hymn asks and then answers:

What can wash away our sin?

Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Today’s blessed exhortation is to keep our eyes on the cross and the redemptive, saving work Jesus did there, bearing our sins and disgrace while dying the death we deserved. Indeed:

God made Him (Jesus) who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. 2 Corinthians 5:21

Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift of pardon, grace, mercy, and love!

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.