A Greater Tabernacle
Jesus is Greater: An Exposition of Hebrews

Transcript

Continuing our series through the book of Hebrews, today we're in Hebrews chapter nine. We've entitled this series, “Jesus is Greater.” It's based on chapter one, verse four of Hebrews. Hebrews 1:4 (NLT) “This shows that the Son is far greater than the angels, just as the name God gave him is greater than their names.” And that's what the book of Hebrews is about.

The book proposes to speak to those Jewish background believers of the first century, thus the name, “Hebrews,” to show them how Jesus Christ is greater than all things. He's greater than whatever you're facing today. He's greater than whatever system preceded that. Jesus is greater. And so we're in part 14 now of our series.

We started this in September of 2023, a year ago, and we went through the first five chapters last fall. Then we picked it up at chapter five, and now we're at chapter nine. Now, we won't finish this Fall. We'll take a break for Christmas and for other things in the upcoming year. We'll come back next Fall and get the last three chapters 11 through 13.

It's been our practice that when we're taking on a big book like this, instead of speeding through it and trying to get through it in one season, we take it in “bites.” That's what our practice has been, so stay on the “bus” with us. Stay on the “Bible bus.” We're going verse by verse, taking our time, learning from the book of Hebrews.

This brings us to chapter 9, verses 1 through 14. We've entitled this message, ‘’A Greater Tabernacle.” In Jesus, We have one who serves as our great high priest in a heavenly tabernacle which is greater than the foreshadowing, the symbolic shadow of the true One in heaven. And so He is greater than the one on earth. And through Christ, we have all access, all expenses paid, VIP access to the throne room of God through this tabernacle that Jesus offers.

Now, I don't know how many of you have been to Disney World. You've been to Disney World and you've gone to see Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse. Alot of people, a lot of young kids dream of going to Disney World.

And it's a wonderful world. And I've been a few times. Maybe you've been, but its high prices and long lines take some of the wonder out of it. But I've heard recently you can get a VIP ticket. You can get a VIP ticket by just paying a little extra.

Here's what the VIP ticket includes. It includes a personal tour guide, a personalized agenda and all access. Skipping to the front of the line tickets, no waiting for rides and shows, priority seating for the fireworks at night, and even free snacks. Can you believe it? How much

you ask? How much for this little extra you need to pay for this VIP ticket at Disney World? Well, it costs $160 on average per person just to get in the gate. You only need to add $900 per person to get the VIP ticket. That's only $1,060.

If you're a family of five. Go ahead, drop the 5K. You can get the VIP ticket. Here's the thing, I'm saying it costs more to have full on VIP treatment like that at Disney World.

And not only that, what Christ offers is He has paid more, He's paid the ultimate price and He offers a better access to God. That's really what we're talking about today. I wonder, today, do you feel like a VIP with God? Do you feel like God views you as a very important person? You might not think of yourself as very important.

I don't think of myself that way. But God must think of us that way. If He would send the very best, His one and only Son to die in our place, He must really place high value on us to give us Jesus. Yet we often struggle, don't we, with our identity about feeling valued. Maybe you're here this morning and you struggle with self doubt, feelings of inadequacy, maybe feelings of shame and guilt from something you did in your past.

Maybe you just can't get it out of your head that whenever you're alone there's like a movie that plays in your head that reminds you of some of the mistakes that you've committed in the past. And there's this inner voice that keeps condemning you for it. Maybe you feel disconnected from God today. Maybe you're here today and you've never given your life to God. And the whole idea of being able to be in a personal relationship with God is something that, well, you'd love to have it, but you don't know how.

Or you know that you are right with God. You're in a relationship with God, but you feel dry today. You feel spiritually distant from God. It's like when you pray, your prayers bounce off the ceiling and just boomerang back in your lap. I don't know where you're at today, but here's what chapter nine of Hebrews is really about.

It's talking to us about how the ministry of Christ is in the true tabernacle, the heavenly place, where in Christ believers have full VIP access to the Father. For those who know Jesus. In this book, chapter nine, the author told the Hebrew background believers that the heavenly tabernacle where Jesus serves as high priest is greater than the old. And I believe as we look at the text today, we'll see three reasons why this is so. So let's dig in chapter nine and we'll begin at verse one through verse 14.

Hebrews 9:1-14 (ESV) 1 “Now even the first covenant had regulations for worship and an earthly place of holiness. 2 For a tent was prepared, the first section, in which were the lampstand and the table and the bread of the Presence. It is called the Holy Place. 3 Behind the second curtain was a second section called the Most Holy Place, 4 having the golden altar of incense and the ark of the covenant covered on all sides with gold, in which was a golden urn holding the manna, and Aaron's staff that budded, and the tablets of the covenant. 5 Above it were the cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat. Of these things we cannot now speak in detail.

6 These preparations having thus been made, the priests go regularly into the first section, performing their ritual duties, 7 but into the second only the high priest goes, and he but once a year, and not without taking blood, which he offers for himself and for the unintentional sins of the people. 8 By this the Holy Spirit indicates that the way into the holy places is not yet opened as long as the first section is still standing 9 (which is symbolic for the present age). According to this arrangement, gifts and sacrifices are offered that cannot perfect the conscience of the worshiper, 10 but deal only with food and drink and various washings, regulations for the body imposed until the time of reformation. 11 But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation) 12 he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.

13 For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, 14 how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.” This is God's word. I hope you studied. Did you study this week, reading ahead? We've been talking, I know, as we go through a book like the book of Hebrews, which some have rightly, I think, understood that perhaps of all the books in the Bible, in the New Testament, that it helps us understand how the Old Testament and the New Testament fit together and how one supports the other, how one fulfills the other.

And so I'm glad that you're here today. I hope you're studying and preparing, because these messages are a little more challenging to understand. But let's try to see if we can put the cookies on the bottom shelf, as we do every week. We attempt to do that so the little kids can reach them. And so let's give the first reason now why the tabernacle of Jesus is greater.

1. It offers unrestricted access to God’s throne.

It offers unrestricted access to God's throne. It offers unrestricted access to God's throne. As we look at the opening verses of chapter nine, may I say to you that I believe the author is telling us the story of the Old Tabernacle, the tabernacle of Moses, the tabernacle that was built in the wilderness, fashioned after the actual tabernacle that he saw on Mount Sinai. When God revealed the actual, he went and built a copy of it, a shadow of it.

And so we see in these first verses, the author is describing it. Well, why? Why is he describing it? I think he describes it in order to show us that it did not offer unrestricted access. Indeed, it offered only highly restricted access.

In fact, only one person could go in per year, only once a year. And that person had to be the high priest. And he could only go in if he was carrying the blood of the lamb. Okay? And so he represented God's people.

He went in as a representative. But God's people, they couldn't go in there. And so he's describing the way that worked. I think that that was a good way to remind the Hebrew background believers of the shortcoming of the tabernacle system of the Old Testament, that it didn't give you VIP access to God, it only gave you a foreshadowing of it. And it's also good for us Gentiles to go, what was that all about?

So that we can look at it and say, well, it was a foreshadowing of that which Christ fulfilled, but it did not do all that was needed. It only prepared the way for Jesus. So let's unpack it quickly. He spends five verses describing what he calls the first section and the second section. I am just going to rush through this because he actually tells us to not go into too much detail.

Did you see that? Verse 5? He says, “Of these things, we cannot now speak in detail.” So we'll go fast. But just a few things for those of us that aren't that familiar with tabernacle worship of the Old Testament.

He says in verse one, it's an earthly place of holiness. This is not the heavenly tabernacle he speaks of; it's the earthly. It's the one in the wilderness. He calls it a tent in verse two.

In fact, the word tent is in our text twice. I think a better contextual translation here would have been tabernacle. It's in verse two and verse 11, the word tent. It's an accurate translation of the Greek word, “skēnē,” which does mean tent. But as most translations decide, they decide to call it tabernacle, because the context is he is talking about the place of worship, not just any tent, but a tabernacle.

So for a tent, verse 2. For a tabernacle, look at verse 11. You'll see where we got the title for this message. This was just so great. Sometimes we're like, what's this passage about?

But if you look at verse 11, we know what this passage is about, because he tells us. He says, “then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation)” Not made with human hands, but made by the Lord. And so he says, it's a greater tabernacle. We said, hey, we probably ought to call this sermon a greater tabernacle. It's right there in verse 11.

Anyway, so the first few verses, the first five verses, he's talking about the former too.

So, for a tent, he's talking about the former one. He says in the first section, there was a lampstand, a table with bread on it.

Then the second section, and he begins to describe it. So here's what I want to do, just to make this go faster. Instead of me just really unpacking every verse, let's put up a picture, an artistic rendering of what that may have looked like that might help us. Okay, so this is kind of a rendering of what the tabernacle in the wilderness may have looked like. Okay.

And we know that there was an outer court with a curtain entrance right here. Okay. Now, the only people that were allowed in the outer court were Jewish circumcised males. They had to be Jewish believers. And they would come into this court and they would bring their offerings, their thanksgiving offerings, their sin offerings.

They would bring those in and they would be sacrificed on the altar by the Levite priests. They would be washed in the bronze laver right here, this giant laver that they kept water in. And so this is where it was happening. And daily sacrifices were offered right here. If you were a woman or a child, you had no access to even that deep into the tabernacle system.

Okay, this is what we're talking about. They had limited access to God to be able to worship Him directly, because God is holy and man is not holy. And so it's symbolic of that. So only Jewish men could be here. Now go to the next slide.

We're going to enter into the tabernacle tent itself. The first section, called the Holy Place, has these three pieces of furniture. It has the golden lampstand with seven lamps upon it. Right. The modern lampstand is called a menorah.

It has nine, but it's not like this one because it's based on the idea of Hanukkah. But the one in the temple had seven, which is the number of perfection. Upon the table of presents, there were 12 loaves of bread, which represented the 12 tribes. And we see this being talked about.

This is the first section. And then we also see in the first section the altar of incense. Now, very quickly, there is a theological conundrum right there where it talks about this in verse four. I don't think it's as complicated as some people make it.

But verse four says
“having the golden altar of incense,” it places it in the second section. But whereas, clearly in the book of Leviticus, it's in the first section, as we see depicted in this artistic rendering. So how do we solve that problem? The book of Hebrews says that it's in the second section. The rest of the Bible says it's in the first section.

What's Hebrews talking about? The context of Hebrews clearly seems to be talking about the day of atonement, when the high priest would carry incense in a golden censer into the holy place. I think there's a misunderstanding here that he's talking about the piece of furniture.

He's talking about the incense being carried in a golden censer into the place because he would come in with the blood of the lamb and the censer. The other thing is, it's right up against the curtain to the most holy place. And so the incense smoke would rise like the prayers of the saints, which would go into this holy place as well. Okay, and so that's what he's talking about. Then he says, there's a second section behind the second curtain and wherein there's the Ark of the Covenant.

And he even tells us what was originally put in the ark. Did you see that in the text? He says that there is a golden container there that contains the manna, an example of manna that God fed them for forty years. There was also Aaron's staff, which actually to prove that he was the true High Priest, it actually budded with an almond blossom. And then also, of course, the two tablets which represented the Ten Commandments. That is contained in the Ark of the Covenant.

On top of that, the cherubim with their wings outstretched over top. And then this is called the Mercy Seat, which is like the throne of God, where the High Priest would offer the blood of the Lamb on the day of atonement, Yom Kippur. Why did he tell us all of this? Well, first of all, he knew the Hebrews already knew it. He knew the Gentiles needed to know it.

Okay, but the main reason I think he's telling us this is found in verse 8. And here he speaks of how the Holy Spirit has shown him something. As the author of this passage, he says, 8 “By this the Holy Spirit indicates that the way into the holy places is not yet opened as long as the first section is still standing.” As long as these two curtains are still there, the way is not open. There's no full on VIP access for God's people.

In fact, the only one that can get all the way in is the High Priest. And he can only go in one day a year. And he has to go in carrying the blood of the Lamb. And as it looks here, it describes that when he comes in, in verse seven, it says, “but into the second only the high priest goes, and he but once a year, and not without taking blood, which he offers for himself and for the unintentional sins of the people.” And so even he, as a representative of God, he's a sinner too.

He has to bring blood for himself. They have very limited access and they're on the payment plan. They have to keep making these offerings. If somebody doesn't make a final deposit to make them good, they're no good. They're on a system that needs reformation.

Did you see that word, reformation, down in verse 10? They need something stronger, something greater to fulfill it. Or else they'll keep on being in this pattern. They don't have unrestricted access to God. They want it.

They have a desire in their heart for it, but they don't have it. But yet, Christ through his tabernacle. So what we have here is an argument from the negative. It's an unusual way to make an argument, by giving you why that temple is lesser. It's showing us why Christ's temple is greater.

So here's what we see. Romans chapter five.

Listen to this.
Romans 5:1-2 (ESV) 1 “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. If you're taking notes, underline the word access. You've obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, in which we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

We have access. We have an all expense paid VIP pass to the throne room of God through Jesus, through His ministry in the tabernacle. Earlier, in chapter four of Hebrews, we read this, Hebrews 4:14-16 (ESV) 14 “Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.He didn't have a sin. He didn't need to pay for his own sin. See that verse 16.

16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” We can come boldly. We can come with confidence. The curtain has been torn. We read the Gospels.

We see that when Jesus was crucified after He said, “It is finished,” paid in full, that there was an earthquake and the curtain that separated the holy place from the most holy place was rent from top to bottom, thus symbolizing that it was no longer needed, that the way is open. What the Holy Spirit said, that as long as it stood, the way was not open. Now, through Christ, the way is open. We can come boldly and confidently and come to the throne room of grace.

My father died when I was 8 years old. Many of you know that is a big mark of my life. I'm the oldest of four kids. And one of the things is, it's often true, I've noticed in other people's lives that the greatest subtraction in your life is often the place of healing that God gives you. And it becomes the greatest addition in your life from God's grace.

So the loss of my father really was a great subtraction. But God so filled me up with grace and mercy that it became the greatest addition of my life. Which I think even to be a pastor today was because of that loss. But God did that work in me. But I still remember as a teenager struggling.

I had a father wound. I was looking for advice like, where do I go to school? I turned 16. How do I buy a car? We live off of Social Security, we were poor.

My mom didn’t know what to do. Just things you want to be able to do when you're a young teenager and you need somebody. Fortunately, my father had a twin brother and his name was Clyde, my Uncle Clyde. And he was the president of the bank of Damascus in Damascus, Virginia. And so when it was time for me to have a car, I was like, I don't know how to buy a car.

I don't know where to go to get a car. I know I'd like to have a car. I started bagging groceries at Giant Supermarket andI needed to get back and forth. I remember that.

I didn't know how to get a loan. In fact, I would have been intimidated to go to a bank at 16 years old with no work history, not even having a job yet, right? And sit down with a bank manager and try to fill out a loan application as a 16 year old with no work. I don't think that would have gone very well. But that's not what I did.

You know what I did? I showed up at the bank of Damascus on a Saturday afternoon and I asked , can I see my uncle? And the secretary said, hold on a minute, honey. Would you like something to drink while you wait? And I said, yes, I would.

She brought me a Coke out and so I had to wait for him to get finished with his appointments. But then I went into his office; I went into the president's office. I didn't go to the bank manager's office. I went into the president of the bank of Damascus office and I sat with him. He had snacks brought in and we talked about it. He asks, so you want to buy a car?

What kind of car do you want? I said, I don't know. He said, where are you going to get it? I said, I don't know where I'm going to get it. He goes, well, I know the guy across the street who owns a car lot.

We will go with him and we'll go to the wholesale auctions. We'll buy one wholesale so you don't have to pay retail. I said, oh, okay. So we went to the auctions. I didn't know how to go to an auction, but they knew how to go to an auction. So we went to the auction and I bought myself a car.

And then it was , how do I pay for it? He said, well, we'll give you a loan. We'll put you on a good payment plan. That was my Uncle Clyde.

And so then when it was time to go to college, I needed a student loan. I went to my Uncle Clyde. I showed up on a Saturday afternoon. I got myself a student loan. When it was time to buy my first house, when I was a newlywed,

You know what I did? I just showed up on a Saturday afternoon. I said, hey, Uncle Clyde. He asks , what you need, honey? I said, you know, we're looking at this house.

And he helped me with that. And you know what was even better is after he would help me fill out the loan and help me cut the check, then he'd say, let's go and see what Aunt Irene's made for lunch. And we'd go over to their house and eat lunch afterwards with my Uncle Clyde. Now that is VIP treatment.

You know, there was a great subtraction in my life, but God made provision for me and my family. And I was thinking about what Christ has done is that we're not on a payment plan. We're not trying to earn. In fact, even when we don't know how to get to God and we don't even know the first step, He made the step and built the bridge.

He's given us unrestricted access to God the Father through Christ the Son. Now, listen, if you're sitting here this morning and you feel distant from God, it might be because you've never invited Jesus into your life. That'd be the first thing to do, because he is the way, the truth, and the life. You want access, you have to know Jesus. There is no other but the name of Jesus that you can call on for this.

Maybe you're here today, and you know this, and you have Christ in your life, but you feel distant from God because perhaps you haven't been taking advantage of that open door to just go in and talk to the Father. I was at the men's gathering yesterday morning. We had a men's breakfast for the men's ministry. And one of the questions that brother Randy asked the group was, when's the last time you cried out to God for something? We were talking about blind Bartimaeus and how he cried out to the Lord and said, “Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me.”

When's the last time you did that? What I responded was, I've learned to do that regularly. Early on, I thought I had to do it when I was in desperate condition. But what I've learned is you don't have to wait till you're desperate. In fact, you can go into that room anytime.

You've got unrestricted access to the Father. If you feel distant, go to him and say, Father, why do I feel distant? Why do I feel dry? Why do I feel like a deer panting for living water?

Whenever You're available to me, would you expose to me what's keeping us apart right now, because I know it's not You. It's got to be something in me. Would You show me? You don't have to stay out there.

You can lean in. You have unrestricted access. Well, let's move on. That's the first reason that gets us really through the first part of verse nine,

which is symbolic of the present age. So that whole temple system in the Old Testament is symbolic. It's a foreshadowing of something superior. And so this gets us to the second reason. The second reason the tabernacle of Jesus is greater is:

2. It is able to completely cleanse the conscience.

It's able to completely cleanse the conscience. We're going to look at the latter part of verse 9 and verse 10. Just kind of camp there for a second. I want you to take note, in verse 9, the latter part, it says, “According to this arrangement, gifts and sacrifices are offered that cannot perfect the conscience of the worshiper,”
According to this arrangement, these gifts, these sacrifices that are being offered in this earthly tabernacle under the old covenant cannot perfect the conscience of the worshiper. So they go through all those motions, they go through all those rituals, and it'll clean the outside of the person.

It says that in verse 10, “but deal only with food and drink and various washings, regulations for the body imposed until the time of reformation.” And so it cleans the outside, but it won't clean the inside. It won't perfect the conscience. And the idea of perfection there is from the Greek word, “τελειόω, teleioō,” which means completion to the point of maturity, utterly clean or cleansed. Here is the idea -

it won't get the spot all the way out. It kind of gets the surface clean, but it won't clean on the inside because it's an earthly tabernacle, it's an external religion, it won't get at the heart of the matter. Whereas Jesus, see here again, he's arguing from the opposite. He's arguing from the place of weakness, which is the weak tabernacle, in order to highlight the strength of the greater tabernacle. And so we see this old tabernacle, it was great.

It showed us a lot about what is needed for man and the distance that stands between us and God, apart from a Savior. But it will not cleanse the conscience. It will not show us who we really are. Here's what the Bible says about the conscience in Titus 1:15 (NIV) “To the pure, all things are pure,

but to those who are corrupted and do not believe, nothing is pure. In fact, both their minds and consciences are corrupted.”
And so our consciences, they're not perfected, they're imperfect. They tell us right from wrong. But if we keep doing wrong, it's like we build a callus up so it stops triggering. It misfires, it's corrupted like a bad computer program that runs too slow or runs wrongly.

And so our consciences are corrupted. And so even with the temple system, you would feel better, you know, when you went to temple and offered your sacrifice, and you'd have to wash in one of those baptismal pools outside the tabernacle and put on white clothes before you went in, you'd feel better on the outside. And on the way home, you'd be singing songs and feeling good about yourself, but then you'd get along with yourself. And that voice in your head would go, you loser.

You're still the same person. You still struggle with the same sin you did when you were 10 years old. You haven't changed at all. In fact, I don't think you'll ever change. And if you were really a believer, but you're probably not.

And so all this doubt and all this self doubt and all this self condemnation, which comes from the flesh, but also comes from the evil one who's the accuser. And so your conscience will not be perfected by this outward approach to religiosity. What we need is a relationship through the person of Jesus. So something goes to work on the inside out instead of the outside in. And so we see this in the fact that he's talking about it from its opposite.

In fact, he says in verse 10, “until the time of reformation.” That's the last part of verse 10. And that word, reformation, is not referring to what happened 500 years ago with Martin Luther. He's not talking about that. But he's talking about a word that could have easily been a word that you would hear at the orthodontist's office or at the orthopedic surgeon's office, because it has the idea to make something that's crooked straight.

Something that's crooked straight. It's the Greek word. I'm looking at it here, “διόρθωσις, diorthōsis.” And so it's the idea, ortho, you can hear it in the middle of the Greek word.

It's the idea of something that needs to be straightened that's not perfectly straight. It needs to be brought into perfect alignment with the Father so that our identity, who we say we are, is in alignment with who God says we are. And that's a work that I can't do and you can't do for yourself, that only the work of Christ can tell you who you really are in Christ and your true identity. And so the conscience which condemns and the evil one which condemns via the conscience, he can purify the conscience. He can make it completely clean.

It says in the Hebrews 9:14 (NIV) “How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!” Now, at my house, I'm the expert at making stains, and my wife is the expert at getting them out. We've been married 45 years. I was talking to somebody just before the service started, and I said, yeah, opposites attract, right?

Some of us make messes and some of us clean them up. If we have people at home, we always eat our dinner at the breakfast nook, or if it's a big crowd, we'll eat in the dining room. But it was just me and Robin, and it's during work week and we've worked all day and we're tired, we will often eat dinner in our Lazy Boy recliners.

Do you ever eat dinner in your Lazy Boy? I like to do that. And so sometimes I'll be kicked back at my lazy boy. And I'll be eating something in the distance.

You know, it's better when you're sitting at a table, right? If something drips, you don't have that problem. Sometimes things drip and it'll fall back on the plate. You're good to go. But if you're leaning back, pow, right on your favorite shirt.

And then you take a nap.

So then later that evening, I'll tell Robin that's my favorite shirt. Look what I did. She asks, well, what did you get on it? And I say, something from dinner; I don't know.

I dripped something there. Can you get it out? It's my favorite shirt.

She'll say, I think so; put it there where I can see it and I'll get it out. Now if I try to get it out myself, here's what I'll do.

I'll put some water on it, get it really wet and try to get it out. It looks like I got it out because it's wet and it all looks the same color. But the minute it dries, there's that stain again. Do you know what I'm saying?

See, I'm not good at this, but Robin, when she gets a hold of something. If you have something with a stain, just go to Robin. This is what I've learned. She gets it out.

So then when you put the shirt on, you know, later in the week, you say, way to go, hun. You got that stain out. I'm really good at making stains. She's really good at getting them out.

That's still true. We're all really good at making stains and Jesus is the only one who can get them out. We can try to rub them out. And it looks like we did until we get alone with ourselves.

As soon as we get in a dry spot, there it pops right back out again. But He can get it all the way out. Believer, listen, our conscience can be completely cleaned.

You're carrying a burden of guilt and shame. You're carrying a sense that you'll never be able to scrub it away. He can do it. This is the superiority of His tabernacle and His ministry. He is greater.

3. It secures a once for all eternal redemption.

Greater access, greater cleansing. And then finally, it secures a once for all eternal redemption. We're in the final verses, verses 11 through 14 now. It secures a once for all eternal redemption.

Look at verse 12. It says that His blood, which he brings to the mercy seat there in the heavenly temple. Verse 12

says, “he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.“ Thus securing an eternal redemption, a once for all, one time payment that substantially secures for all time our redemption paid in full. And so this secures us; we no longer have to be on the payment plan. We no longer have to be trying to earn favor with God. I was talking to someone after the first service and I thought, that's something I should bring up at the second service.

I was thinking about this, that when you receive Jesus as your Lord and Savior and you confess your sins to Him and you repent and you ask Him to come into your life, how many of your sins are forgiven? All. All of your past sins, the sins that you've sinned today are forgiven. What about the ones you hadn't done yet, because will you sin again?

You will. You live in a sinful world. Hopefully you won't do it intentionally, but you might. It might be a bad day, but how many of your sins are forgiven when you receive Jesus? All.

Past, present and future. It's eternal redemption. Once for all. Is that going in your brain? Are you getting that?

What that means and this is what I was thinking about. When you pray and you're feeling guilty because you've sinned again, should you say, Lord forgive me of my sin, I've sinned again? You could say that. And at your level of what you're understanding about that, that's fine.

You're trying to get clean with God. But I was thinking about 1 John 1:9, which says, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” That's a good memory verse. You ought to memorize that one.

”If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” If you confess them to Him, He's forgiven them. How many again? Just checking - past, present, future. So when you go to Him again and you've got a feeling of guilt in your conscience, what if you prayed like this?

This is something that I've been doing for some time now. Lord, thank You that you've already forgiven me, but I've stumbled back into something here and I didn't mean to, but sin's a slippery slope. And I know I'm forgiven. I know that. But I feel dirty and I feel unworthy to talk to You right now because this is a sin pattern I've had.

This particular one has gotten me before. Maybe it's losing your temper. Maybe it's an addiction. I don't know.

We all have that weak spot. We all have that thorn in the flesh, don't we? And so then you feel ashamed to go back to Him because you've gone to Him so many times. But you know intellectually and you know from God's word that you're forgiven. Past, present and future.

How do you deal with that? This is something I've been doing. He is faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us. So, Lord, I know I'm forgiven. Would You give me a fresh cleansing of my conscience right now so that I know it from the inside out?

Not just intellectually, but I know it in my heart. Would You help me? Remind me that I'm clean before You. Fully clean. I'm just trying to think practically how this works in my life.

Maybe that'll help you in your life. He goes on here and he's talking in verses 11 through 14. When Christ appears, verse 11, when He appears, and then He brings this greater and more perfect tent, this greater and more perfect tabernacle not made by human hands, and He goes into this throne room bringing His own blood and He secures this eternal redemption. He says, 13 “For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, 14 how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.” You see, as long as you're beating yourself up and feeling disabled by sin and shame from the past, you'll never really be able to serve the living God.

You'll always feel unworthy to do anything for God. You'll always be circling the drain. I'm not good enough. Woe is me. This is not the new identity He wants to give us.

In Jesus. I know part of Me knows I'm not worthy to be in front of You. Part of me knows that because I know what my 66 years looked like. But then the true identity that I have in Christ, which is Christ in me, the hope of glory, that identity I have in Christ, says, no, you're forgiven. No, you're clean.

No, you've been made perfect in My sight and your conscience is being perfected. Therefore, I release you now to go preach My word. And now I can do it humbly, without any ownership and without trying to claim my own way, knowing that all that I have and all that I am comes from Him. Oh, it's such a release to find out who we are in Christ. In Ephesians 1:7 (ESV) it says, “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace.”

What the law couldn't do, what the old tabernacle couldn't do, God has done through Christ. Romans 8:1-4 (ESV) 1 “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. 3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh

and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.” What the law couldn't do, what the old tabernacle couldn't do, it could only foreshadow it. It could only point to that which would fulfill it. God did when He sent Jesus. Jesus is greater.

He's greater than anything you're facing today. Even your conscience. He can get in there and clean it up and help you with it. And you don't have to make payments on it. You don't have to keep earning it.

Some years ago, we bought my wife a Ford Taurus. And a few years after that, the brakes needed to be replaced. And so we went to the dealer and he said, yeah, we got this thing called lifetime brakes. And I said, okay, that probably costs extra. Yeah, it costs a little extra, but the life of the car, we'll replace them for free.

I said, okay. And so in 2013, I put these lifetime brakes on. I paid a little extra. Then earlier this year, 2024, by the way, we drive cars until the wheels fall off. That's how we roll.

The Taurus was in the shop and the dealer called me and said, yeah, well, it's going to cost this much. You're going to need new brakes. And I said, I think I bought life-time brakes. And he says, well, let me look. I don't see anything on the computer.

And he said, it's going to cost this much. And I said, well, man, I thought I bought those life-time brakes. I can't remember. But then I remembered I always put the receipts from the dealer in the glove box of that car. And so, when I got to the dealer, I said, can I go look in my car before I pay?

He goes, yeah, you can go look in your car. So I went out there, dug in the glove box, and sure enough, I pulled it out. 2013 life-time brakes. And I walked in there and I said, hey, life-time brakes. And he says, sure enough.

We redid our computer system. It doesn't go back to 2013. I said, well, I have the hard copy right here. Guess what?

It was free. I didn't have to make payments on it. It had already been paid in full. I was happy about that. I was happy about that.

You know what? I have a hard copy right here. I have a hard copy right here. Whenever I'm filled with doubt, whenever my conscience convicts me wrongly because I'm clean, I'm forgiven, I'm born again, I stand before the Father without apology. I can come into the mercy seat of God and I can ask for whatever is on my heart because I am in Jesus and Jesus is in me.

I have the hard copy right here.

We're preaching from Hebrews today. It matters, doesn't it? We have the hard copy right here, the lifetime guarantee.

We have unlimited, unrestricted access, a cleansed conscience because of His ministry, and an eternal redemption that's paid in full. Do you know Him today? Do you know Jesus today? Do you have your confidence in Him? Let's pray.

Lord, I pray for the person that's here today that's never given their life to you. Maybe they're watching online. Maybe they're right here in this room or in the room next door. Lord, You're speaking to hearts wherever they are. We trust that when Your word goes out, that it never returns void.

So I pray right now for you, my friend. Would you give your life to Jesus? Would you confess Him as Lord and Savior? Would you say, right now, I'm a sinner, I repent of my sin, and I believe You died on the cross for me, Lord, and that You were raised from the grave. Would You come and live in me today and forgive me of my sin and make me a child of God? If you're praying that prayer of faith, believing, He'll save you. He'll give you access to the Father.

Others are here. And you know this. You know this relationship with Jesus, but you've been feeling beat up. You've been feeling the feelings of shame and self condemnation. You've been feeling unworthy.

You've been feeling distant. Oh, would you come into the throne room? Would you remember what you have in Jesus? Would you cry out to Him and be reminded of the great price that He's already paid for your VIP access to the Father? Oh, we pray it all in Jesus’ name.

Amen.