A NEW AND LIVING WAY!

A NEW AND LIVING WAY!

Heb 10:16-22

16 This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them;

17 And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more.

18 Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin.

19 Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus,

20 By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh;

21 And having an high priest over the house of God;

22 Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.

          Throughout the book of Hebrews, the writer is always comparing the old covenant with the new. The old sacrificial system is the old and dead or dying way. It required that the sacrifice dye and to remain dead yet this bloodletting was insufficient to wash away sins. There was a perpetual need to offer more and more sacrifices.

Heb 10:1

For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect.

Heb 10:11

11 And every priest standeth daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins:

          This “new” (fresh and recent) way required a perfect sacrifice but only required it once for all. It is “living” because of the resurrection. The power of Christ’s sacrifice is not in His death but in his resurrected life! Christ ever lives to make intercession for us. (Hebrews 7:25) This is the new and living way. Those who continue to demand adherence to “dead works” are keeping from themselves a wonderful way of life.

Heb 9:13-14

13 For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh:

14 How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

          Communion then is not a re-offering of the sacrifice of Jesus but rather a memorial of His death. Because He lives there is no need to shed His blood again and again. To do so is to revert to the old and dying way.  “Christ is the new and living way! We come to God through Him, our High Priest over the house of God (the church, see Heb 3:6). When His flesh was torn on the cross, and His life sacrificed, God tore the veil in the temple. This symbolized the new and living way now opened for all who believe.” (from The Bible Exposition Commentary.)

Dear Holy High Priest, thank you for sprinkling your own blood upon the mercy seat for me. Thank you for rising again that I might serve and walk in a new and living way. AMEN