The Blood Trail 12/21/2024

Hebrews 9:22 NLT

In fact, according to the law of Moses, nearly everything was purified with blood. For without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness.

The writer of Hebrews is making the case that Jesus was the ultimate sacrifice

Blood must be spilled to forgive sin, and Jesus was the final and ultimate sacrifice

In order to understand what was going on at the cross, we must first back the old testament, also known as the old covenant, to see the trail of blood that led to Jesus

We’re going to start in Genesis with Adam and Eve’s decision to disobey God

So looking at Genesis 3, we all know the story, right?

They ate from the tree whose fruit the Lord commanded them not to eat and once they did, they covered themselves with fig leaves for clothing because they were naked.

The story is simple. God said not to do something, Adam and Eve ignored God, and they suffered the consequences. Regardless, something significant happens in verse 21.

Genesis 3:21 NLT

And the Lord God made clothing from animal skins for Adam and his wife.

Adam and Eve tried to deal with their sin in a way that made sense to them, but God said that wasn’t good enough.

He makes the first sacrifice to provide them with clothing.

The blood of those animals covered their sin.

The is the first recorded death, but the blood trail leads throughout the bible right up to Jesus’s cross

Now we’re going to jump forward quite a few hundred years to a man named Abram

God has called him from his home town and had promised him a child and a mighty natioN

Lets see what happens in Genesis 15

Genesis 15:9–10 NLT

The Lord told him, “Bring me a three-year-old heifer, a three-year-old female goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtledove, and a young pigeon.” So Abram presented all these to him and killed them. Then he cut each animal down the middle and laid the halves side by side; he did not, however, cut the birds in half.

Genesis 15:17–18 NLT

After the sun went down and darkness fell, Abram saw a smoking firepot and a flaming torch pass between the halves of the carcasses. So the Lord made a covenant with Abram that day and said, “I have given this land to your descendants, all the way from the border of Egypt to the great Euphrates River—

This ceremony is common in Middle Eastern Cultures. In fact, some cultures still practice something similar today.

When two parties would make an agreement, they would slaughter an animal, drain its blood. In doing this, they were saying “May this happen to me if I break my end of the bargain.”

God had made many promises to Abram and asked only one thing in return…The Abram and his family would serve him.

When Gold told him to select these animals and arrange them in a blood path, Abram knew exactly what was going on.

God sealed his covenant after Abram faithfully slaughtered and prepared all animals according to God’s directions.

A little later in Abrams life in Genesis 22 comes the story of where God told Abram to sacrifice his son, but God provides a ram for the offering becuase Abram was faithful.

Now lets skip forward about 400 years.

Israel has been enslaved by Egypt. God had brough 9 plagues upon the Egyptians, and the 10th was going to be the biggest.

The first born of everything would die.

In order to protect themselves, God gives instructions to the Israelites in Exodus 12.

Exodus 12:21–23 NLT

Then Moses called all the elders of Israel together and said to them, “Go, pick out a lamb or young goat for each of your families, and slaughter the Passover animal. Drain the blood into a basin. Then take a bundle of hyssop branches and dip it into the blood. Brush the hyssop across the top and sides of the doorframes of your houses. And no one may go out through the door until morning. For the Lord will pass through the land to strike down the Egyptians. But when he sees the blood on the top and sides of the doorframe, the Lord will pass over your home. He will not permit his death angel to enter your house and strike you down.

Passover Lamb. The lamb had to be perfect…flawless and without blemish.

How do you keep an outside animal in perfect condition for an entire year? In order to do this, they would have to bring this lamb into their house almost from birth. They would have to raise it and protect it all of it’s life.

At that point, its not just a food animal, its a pet.

Then they would have to that lamb and slaughter it in their place.

We today often give ourselves a pass on our sins, but imagine if every year, you had to kill your dog or cat because of your sin. Now that’s a lot more real, isn’t it?

When the Israelites brushed the doorposts of their houses with the blood, it made a shape. What was that shape? It was a cross.

Deliverance comes through the blood of that which is innocent.

Lets keep moving forward following the blood trail.

The book of Leviticus is a very bloody one as it lays out the specific types of sacrifices God required for each violation of his law in following the old covenant.

In the years that followed, hundreds of thousands of bulls, goats, sheeps, and doves were killed to fulfill God’s righteous requirements.

At various times, blood was also sprinkled on objects as well as the people themselves to solemnize God’s covenant with them.

The Bible itself is also a very blood book in general. Why is this? Leviticus 17:11 tell us

“......... It is the blood, given in exchange for a life, that makes purification possible.”

And going back to the first verse we started with in Hebrews, it sumamrizes it clearly “for without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness.”

And now, I would like us to go back to Hebrews 9:11–22 which fully explains why Christ was the perfect Sacrifice.

Hebrews 9:11–22 NLT

So Christ has now become the High Priest over all the good things that have come. He has entered that greater, more perfect Tabernacle in heaven, which was not made by human hands and is not part of this created world. With his own blood—not the blood of goats and calves—he entered the Most Holy Place once for all time and secured our redemption forever. Under the old system, the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer could cleanse people’s bodies from ceremonial impurity. Just think how much more the blood of Christ will purify our consciences from sinful deeds so that we can worship the living God. For by the power of the eternal Spirit, Christ offered himself to God as a perfect sacrifice for our sins. That is why he is the one who mediates a new covenant between God and people, so that all who are called can receive the eternal inheritance God has promised them. For Christ died to set them free from the penalty of the sins they had committed under that first covenant. Now when someone leaves a will, it is necessary to prove that the person who made it is dead. The will goes into effect only after the person’s death. While the person who made it is still alive, the will cannot be put into effect. That is why even the first covenant was put into effect with the blood of an animal. For after Moses had read each of God’s commandments to all the people, he took the blood of calves and goats, along with water, and sprinkled both the book of God’s law and all the people, using hyssop branches and scarlet wool. Then he said, “This blood confirms the covenant God has made with you.” And in the same way, he sprinkled blood on the Tabernacle and on everything used for worship. In fact, according to the law of Moses, nearly everything was purified with blood. For without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness.

This is an eternal principle established by the creator. This then the blood trail from Eden that ultimately leads to Jesus’s cross.

John the baptist called Jesus “Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world.”

Jesus was the only perfect human without sin or blemish that could pay for the sins of all humanity once and for all.

After Jesus died, the bible mentions no more bloody sacrifice.

Although the Jews continued these practices for about another 25 years, the Temple was soon destroyed and all such sacrifices ceased.

The perfect Lamb had been offered and the full price for our sin had been paid.

The Bible’s blood trail ends at Jesus dying on the cross.

As we observe the holiest of blood trails today, lets thank, worship, and praise God for giving his son and for Jesus’s willingness to shed his own holy blood to save us.

No with this in mind, we need to practice gratefulness.

I dont think that most Christians relaly understand the significance of what Jesus did for us.

Oh yeah, we say we are grateful for our salvation, but I think that deep down, there are times where we take it for granted. We dont always appreciate the fact that we are no longer held to the old convenant, to the practice of shedding animal blood to cover our sins. If we were still held to that standard today, it would be impossible to stay clean because we are humans. It is our nature to sin. The blood of the animals only made humans outwardly clean as we read in Hebrews 9:13.

But as we read just a little further down in Hebrews 9: 15, with Christ sacrifice, him shedding his blood as the ultimate sacrifice, he covers our sins. We can enter the new convenant of being covered by his blood, his grace, and his love. We dont have to repeatedly go back to the alter

We must realize the utter depth from which we were saved and the incredible price paid to redeem us.