THE EXPECTATION OF CHRIST'S COMING

Introduction

-We are celebrating Christ’s birth and then we are celebrating a New Year, and I don’t think any year has been so looked forward to as 2021.

~Quite often, as part of the New Year, we start new Bible reading plans, many of us attempt to read the entire Bible within that year.

~If you have never tried to read the entire Bible, I highly encourage you to do so.

-But what often happens is that we start out with a bang, and then we get to the end of Exodus and Leviticus and Numbers and Deuteronomy, and it seems to bog us down with all this detail about things that don’t seem to make sense to us and don’t seem that important.

-It describes to the finest detail the construction of the tabernacle. And it tells us the intricate steps that they had to take to offer specific sacrifices for specific reasons. And it explains that various festivals that they celebrated for different things that God did in the life of their nation.

-And we Christians look at that and wonder why on earth is that in there and what does that have to do with us now? We don’t go to a tabernacle or temple. We don’t sacrifice animals. We don’t celebrate Passover and Yom Kippur and all that. So, why deal with it now.

-There are several reasons that these details are important. I mean, one, because God recorded it, and it is the inspired Word of God, so it must be important. But secondly, they point to Christ.

~When we read the Old Testament, we look at it through different lenses than the original audiences, because everything they did was a picture and type that looked forward to Jesus. So, as we read these passages that seem impossible to us, we look for Christ in them.

-They pointed to a greater expectation, and Jesus, beginning with His birth and then on from there, brought these expectations to completion.

~For the Christmas season I have been attempting to put the Christmas story within the context of the overall story of redemption. Christ’s coming was needed and promised and finally fulfilled. But it goes beyond the birth—for the birth was the beginning of the expectation of completion of all things, which the writer of Hebrews indicates. These divine revelations that seem to slow us down point to greater spiritual realities.

-And so, I want us to enjoy the fullness of what Christmas celebrates by having it in our minds that the birth of Christ brings with it the expectation of God bringing to completion all that He intended for humanity. So, may we celebrate Christmas in light of the grander narrative.

-The writer of Hebrews to this point had been discussing the old Levitical system of sacrifices and how insufficient they were to accomplish any sort of permanent spiritual help. He then gets into why that is.

Hebrews 9:23–28 ESV

23 Thus it was necessary for the copies of the heavenly things to be purified with these rites, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. 24 For Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf. 25 Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own, 26 for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. 27 And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment, 28 so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.

1) Christ is the greater reality

-First, the writer of Hebrews indicates that all those things that the Israelites had to build and do were nothing but mere copies of greater spiritual realities. They were temporary pictures of what exist in eternity and what was to come. And all of it finds its ultimate meaning in Christ.

-The earthly tabernacle and temple were mere reflections of greater, eternal truths that exist in the spiritual realm—a heavenly temple that has its spiritual reality in the church, the people of Christ. We are the temple—each of us stones laid on the foundation of the apostles and the cornerstone of Jesus Christ. God’s presence is now within the people themselves, not some mere tent or building.

-The writer of Hebrews notes that the earthly tabernacle and temple themselves had to be constantly purified because they would become defiled by the worldly and carnal. For them to be holy, the priests would have to constantly go through elaborate rituals to cleanse them from all that made them unholy.

~But now, the new, spiritual, temple of God is completely pure at all times because all its sin and defilement has been permanently washed away, with nothing ever to stick to it anymore because Jesus is the creator and cleanser of this new temple—His people. It is through Jesus that this greater reality comes into being.

-Or another example is that Jesus is the Passover lamb, whose shedding of blood causes the wrath of God to pass over all those who believe. The Israelites killed the lamb and placed its blood on the doorposts so that God would pass over them to only kill the firstborn of the Egyptians. Now, through the blood of the Lamb of God, God passes over our sin because it has already been paid for.

-Or, the passage talks about Jesus being a greater High Priest. The High Priest would give all the sacrifices in the earthly tabernacle, but he says that Christ brought an offering into the heavenly temple. Jesus didn’t just make an offering on earth, He offered Himself in eternity.

-All of this indicates that what we read of all these earthly rituals and people and places that seem to bore us to death find their significance in that they point to the greater reality that is found in Jesus.

-The fulfillment of the greater reality began that first Christmas morning. Through Him came the expectation that all of God’s plans would come to their end, their goal, their completion. Jesus is the greater, heavenly reality that made it so.

2) Christ is the greater sacrifice

-You read of a very complex sacrificial system that the Levitical priests had to do on behalf of the people—and had to do them constantly.

~There is the burnt offering which was a voluntary act of worship to express devotion or commitment to God. It was also used as an atonement for unintentional sin. The burnt offering was completely burned at the altar.

~There was the grain offering in which the fruit of the field was offered in the form of a cake or baked bread made of grain. The purpose of the grain offering was to express thanksgiving in recognition of God’s provision and unmerited goodwill toward the person making the sacrifice.

~Then there was the peace offering, which consisted of any unblemished animal from the worshiper’s herd, and/or various grains or breads. This was a sacrifice of thanksgiving and fellowship followed by a shared meal.

~Next there was the sin offering which was to atone for sin and cleanse from defilement.

~And finally, there was the trespass offering that was given as atonement for unintentional sins that required reimbursement to an offended party, and also as a cleansing from defiling sins.

-Every day and every year, over and over again, the Israelites would bring all these sacrifices just as a normal routine or as part of certain festivals, like the Day of Atonement. However, in the passages that come before and after our passage, the writer of Hebrews makes it clear that none of these sacrifices were able to permanently accomplish what they were set up to accomplish. The sin offering could do nothing for sin. The peace offering could not make peace.

~So, what was the point of them? The purpose of these sacrifices were to point to the future when the perfect sacrifice was given. Each of the sacrifices points to Jesus as being the greater sacrifice.

-Jesus is the greater burnt offering who was spiritually perfect and willingly (and completely) gave His life for us. Jesus is the greater grain offering for He alone is the bread of life. Jesus is the greater peace offering in that only the sacrifice of Himself reconciles us to God and makes peace between God and humanity. Jesus is the greater sin offering in that He shed His blood to cleanse us from all our sin. Jesus is the greater trespass offering in that we receive forgiveness for our trespasses against God and man.

-And the writer of Hebrews points out Christ’s greatness in that all those sacrifices had to be given over and over and over again. Day after day. Year after year. All the sacrifices and festivals and rituals had to be repeated because they didn’t eternally complete anything. It’s like they were a Band-Aid over a severed limb. They were mere patchwork that pointed to a better, permanent solution.

-As an example, the writer of Hebrews talks about the Day of Atonement, how the high priest every year would have to enter into the Holy of Holies to atone for sin. But he says that Jesus only sacrificed Himself once and that was all that was needed to atone for all the sin of all humanity for all of time. (or, as he puts it, Jesus put sin away—never to be held against humanity again).

-We celebrate this at Christmas because all those expectations that the sacrificial system pointed towards find their completion in Christ.

3) Christ is the only Savior

-In v. 27 the writer of Hebrews gives us a dose of reality. It is appointed unto man to physically die once. Because of sin and the curse everybody dies. We have all experienced the death of loved ones. Our day will soon come. And after that is judgment.

~There is no reincarnation. There are no second chances. Once you die, your eternal fate is sealed. You will not be able to change your destiny—it will be either heaven or hell.

-The difference between the two has nothing to do with your goodness or niceness or friendliness or churchiness or your religiousness. The difference between the two is Jesus Christ. Because, as morally culpable people, we are lawbreakers and must pay for that.

~Just like computers and computer programs have default settings, our default setting is the eternal wrath of God.

-But, in v. 28 the writer of Hebrews tells us that Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many—to bear the sins of humanity. There was a need for Christ’s coming in that the thoughts and intentions of mankind’s heart was only evil continually. There was a barrier between God and man that only God could do something about, and He promised to do so. The fulfillment began at Christ’s birth. Now, the expected plan of God to deal with sin has been taken care of with Jesus bearing our sin.

-But it doesn’t stop there. Because Jesus isn’t just a great Savior because He saved us from the penalty and power of sin. Jesus is a great Savior because He will remove the very presence of sin.

-In v. 28 the writer of Hebrews says that Christ will appear a second time. And this second time is not to deal with sin, because that’s what He took care of the first time.

~He says that Jesus will return to save those who are eagerly waiting for Him. That doesn’t mean that we aren’t saved now if we are in Christ. It means that we who love and believe in Jesus and are waiting for Him to return will see the full fruits of what we have been expecting. We will have new bodies in a new heaven and a new earth and sin and Satan and all that evil stuff will never bother God’s creation again.

-Herein lies the greatest expectation of Christmas. Not just that Christ came, and not just that He fulfills prophecies, and not just that He executed God’s plan, but the expectation is that He will see it through to its final completion. Like I have said from the beginning of this sermon series, the birth of Jesus is the middle of the entire story. To fully understand it, you need to know understand God’s entire plan.

Closing

-And I pray that this knowledge will do a few things for you:

1) I pray that this will help you persevere through your trials and tribulations. We know that this world is temporary and our stay is temporary, and our great Savior will complete what He came to do to begin with. That knowledge ought to keep us going.

2) I pray that this gives you a richer appreciation for the place of Christmas in your celebrations this year. Christ’s birth is part of a grander story.

3) I pray that you will find opportunities to share this entire story with someone who needs it. May God give you a divine appointment.

4) If you have never trusted in Christ, He is reaching out to you calling you to trust in Him…