Hebrews 10:11-18

 ¹¹Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. ¹²But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, ¹³and since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool. ¹⁴For by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.¹⁵The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. First he says:

¹⁶“This is the covenant I will make with them after that time, says the Lord. I will put my laws in their hearts, and I will write them on their minds.”

¹⁷Then he adds: “Their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more.”

¹⁸And where these have been forgiven, sacrifice for sin is no longer necessary.

The Perfect Sacrifice

This section continues on from yesterday by comparing the imperfection of sacrifices made by humans and the perfection of the sacrifice made by Christ. The contrast could not be larger, while priests are stuck on the treadmill of their day-to-day duties, Christ’s work is finished, and he is now seated at the right hand of God. “For what the law was powerless to do … God did by sending his own Son” (Romans 8:3).

Verse 14 says we were made perfect, and the author supports this claim by quoting Jeremiah, a passage that his audience must have been familiar with: God promising a new covenant to his people. This passage shows that God’s wish is not atonement for sins by repeated sacrifices. Instead, he promises an ultimate sacrifice that allows him to remember his people’s sins no more and to reconcile with them. It is tempting to see Christ’s sacrifice as something that made things OK between us and God, but here we read that there is much more to it. God not only forgives our sins, like an angry god would after finding another subject for his wrath, but he forgets it. Just as the psalmist writes: “As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us” (Psalm 103:12).

Verse 18 concludes that sacrifice for sin is no longer necessary, and it gives us great comfort and assurance. But that does not mean there should be no sacrifice in our lives. Paul, in his letter to the Romans, writes the following: “Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship” (Romans 12:1). It is not a sacrifice for sins, but an offering in view of God’s mercy, it is our response to the gift of God.

By making this sacrifice, we are not consumed like a burnt offering but made alive again. As verse 2 in Romans 12 continues: “Be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” We find the same primes in the quoted passage from the book of Jeremiah, God will put the law in our hearts and write it in our minds. For this reason, an annual reminder of sin (v 3) is no longer necessary.