Hebrews 9a

Hebrews 9

Shawn Bumpers / General

Hebrews

Introduction

The beauty of the tabernacle.

The court – 150 feet long and 75 feet wide.

In the court:

The bronze altar and the laver.

The Tabernacle.

The tabernacle was constructed of forty-eight acacia beams, fifteen feet high and two feet three inches wide. 

The Holy Place

Table of the shewbread.

Acacia wood covered with gold.

To the east was the entrance to the Tabernacle.

To the west – the altar of incense. 

In front of the Holy of Holies, there was the veil or curtain.

Exodus 25:22 NKJV

And there I will meet with you, and I will speak with you from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim which are on the ark of the Testimony, about everything which I will give you in commandment to the children of Israel.

The beauty of the Tabernacle … and later the Temple

v1

“Then indeed” makes us look back to what was just said.

Hebrews 8:13 NKJV

In that He says, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.

Regulations and practices in the tabernacle were ordained of God. 

Romans 8:3 NKJV

For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh,

The law is good and perfect, but it is the flesh that makes it weak to save.

λατρεία latreia “veneration.”

v2-5

Hebrews 9:23 NKJV

Therefore it was necessary that the copies of the things in the heavens should be purified with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.

A shadow of what was in heaven.

7 branched golden lampstand or מְנוֹרָה Menorah

Isaiah 42:6 NKJV

“I, the Lord, have called You in righteousness, And will hold Your hand; I will keep You and give You as a covenant to the people, As a light to the Gentiles,

Isaiah 49:6 NKJV

Indeed He says, ‘It is too small a thing that You should be My Servant To raise up the tribes of Jacob, And to restore the preserved ones of Israel; I will also give You as a light to the Gentiles, That You should be My salvation to the ends of the earth.’ ”

John 8:12 NKJV

Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.”

Philippians 2:14–15 NKJV

Do all things without complaining and disputing, that you may become blameless and harmless, children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world,

John 15:5 NKJV

“I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.

Table of shewbread in the holy place.

Acacia wood covered in gold.

There was also the golden altar.

The golden altar stood in the holy place 

Psalm 141:2 NKJV

Let my prayer be set before You as incense, The lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.

Hebrews 4:16 NKJV

Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Romans 8:33–34 NKJV

Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.

And what we find in the Holy of Holies is all together wonderful for what we were just saying.

The holy of holies contained only the ark of the covenant.

1 John 2:2 NKJV

And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.

There are so many spiritual truths that are wrapped up in these things, and all of them are of value. 

v6-7

v8-10

Divisions of the tabernacle – periods of time.

The way to the Holy of Holies was not open to man.

Jesus lived a perfect life in full obedience to the law of God in thought, word, and deed.

2 Corinthians 5:21 NKJV

For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

The curtain that hung in the way of entrance to the presence of the Father was torn, just as Christ’s body was torn.

Hebrews 7:25 NKJV

Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.

v11

The New Covenant sanctuary superior.

It is heavenly … pure, perfect, and changeless.

Hebrews 10:1 NKJV

For the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with these same sacrifices, which they offer continually year by year, make those who approach perfect.

v12

Series of contrasts – the superiority of the heavenly ministry.

A lesser sacrifice and a perfect sacrifice.

Hebrews 10:4 NKJV

For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins.

John 10:18 NKJV

No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This command I have received from My Father.”

Jesus Christ, however, needed to offer Himself just once.

John 1:29 NKJV

The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!

v13-14

Ceremonial cleansing verses the internal cleansing of the conscience.

The Old Covenant rituals could not change a person’s heart. 

As long as the worshiper obeyed the prescribed regulations, he was declared clean.

Hebrews 8:10 NKJV

For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.

2 Corinthians 3:3 NKJV

clearly you are an epistle of Christ, ministered by us, written not with ink but by the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of flesh, that is, of the heart.

John 14:16 NKJV

And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever—

John 14:17 NKJV

the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.

v15

μεσίτης Mesitēs

Legal connotations.

An arbiter or a peacemaker in legal or business disputes.

Hebrews 8:12 NKJV

For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.”

The blessings under the Old Covenant depended on the obedience of God’s people.

If they obeyed God, He blessed them; but if they disobeyed, He withheld His blessings. 

Ephesians 1:3 NKJV

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ,