The Rooted Podcast

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There seems to be this intimate relationship between sacrifice and covenant. This first covenant can't meet that requirement of a great relationship with God. Whereas the Old Testament sacrificial system was transactional, the New Testament sacrifice of Jesus shifts the ground so that it becomes relational. In the Old Testament, this has to be done once a year, but that also points towards necessity to...

better solution that can be done eternally. There was forgiveness for sins through these sacrifices, but it didn't really touch the heart or the conscience of a person. And the coming of Jesus as Messiah brought this plan to perfection. You're listening to the Rooted Podcast from Bible Society. In each series, we take a closer look at a theme or book of the Bible and explore its relevance in our lives today. This is our series on Hebrews.

Well, hello, everybody. Welcome back to the Rooted Podcast. I am Mark and I'm joined by Esther and our special guest, Yin, as we continue our look at the book of Hebrews. And today we're going to be looking at the theme of sacrifice, which is a really big theme in the book. And we will take a look at what sacrifice is and how it's seen in the Old Testament, how Jesus' sacrifice works and how this all affects us today. So, we'll try and cover some real life applications.

So before we get too far, Yin, just introduce yourself to our listeners if you wouldn't mind. Yeah, thanks for having me here. So my name is Yinxuan Huang and I am known as Yin. I am now serving as a research manager at the Bible Society. I am married to Annie and we have a seven-year-old son called Joshua. I was born and raised in Shanghai in China and I now also serve as a

Youth and Children's Sunday School teacher at a local Chinese church in Oxford. And I must say that I'm a very proud fan of Liverpool. That's the most important thing I want to bring up. Yes, so that's me. Great. Thank you very much. And you also contributed to the rooted Hebrews journal, did you not? So was really good to read some of your contributions again. And it's really good to have you.

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So, before we go any further, just to say if you're not already subscribed to The Rooted Podcast, then please do subscribe and leave us a review if you like this episode and share it with your friends and family as well. Let's get into our subject for this episode. As we've been going through Hebrews, we've been able to see how it's aimed at Jewish Christians who are sort of relapsing.

undervaluing Jesus, and the whole book seems to be aimed at showing the supremacy of Jesus Christ. We've reached chapters 9 and 10, which are really majoring on sacrifice and trying to unpack the relationship between the death of Christ and Old Testament sacrifice. And if you look at the end of chapter 8, that's all about covenant, and there seems to be this intimate relationship between sacrifice and covenant.

And I wondered, Esther, if you could just start us off by unpacking that a little bit. Yes. We need to understand what a covenant is. And essentially, it's an agreement between God and people, which is an incredible idea when you even think about it, because the creator of the world, who is completely good, completely holy, all powerful, why would he even want to?

make an agreement, make a covenant with people, with sinful people. I mean, the whole Bible story kind of unpacks that. But what it usually looks like, if you think about covenants in the Bible, like the one that God makes with Abraham, the one that he makes with Moses, God makes a promise to his people, but he also sort of expects something from them as well. So, if you look at Exodus chapter 19,

where God makes this Mosaic covenant. He says to them, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine, and you shall be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. So you can see what the promise is there. You'll be this treasured possession of mine, that you'll have this relationship with me, but you need to obey my voice and keep my covenant. So you need to keep your side of the agreement.

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I think, yeah, this is what we'll be unpacking as we look at the covenant today, what the author of Hebrews is saying about that. Because he kind of says, doesn't he, in chapter 8, that this first covenant, or this Mosaic covenant, it can't make the people perfect. can't meet that requirement of a great relationship with God. So, they needed a new covenant. Thank you. And the sacrificial system was part of this covenant keeping,

So it's not just about what goes on in your head, it's things that you actually do. And the sacrificial system was the expression of, or one of the expressions of, the people keeping their end of the bargain. Yeah. Absolutely. And that's covered, you know, after Exodus 19, it goes on right through to Exodus 29. It talks about, you know, God gives them the law so that they understand what his moral standards are.

He tells them how to build this tabernacle so they can meet with him. And then he talks about the sacrificial system. How can they sort of be in right relationship with him? And then there's the priesthood, who's going to administer that. So that's all in those chapters in Exodus. And right at the end of Exodus 29, the whole point is this is so that he can dwell with his people. That's the whole purpose of what he wants out of it.

They need to do these things so that that relationship is good enough that they can live alongside each other. Yeah, yeah. And there's a whole list of really detailed instructions about how you're to sacrifice and when you're to sacrifice. Ian, I wonder if you could just come in here and just talk about how sacrifice actually worked. I mean, what did people think they were doing when they sacrificed? I think if we restrict our discussion to

Old Testament era. There's obviously a transactional element here. So on the one hand, people are offering sacrifice with the hope that at least for a certain period of time, their sins, their crimes can be washed away through this action, if you like. And on the other hand, as I'm from God's point of view,

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He loves us. He wants us to be free from sin. and again, it's Old Testament. So in that period of time and through the sacrifice, were, or let's say Israelites, they were reminded of their sins every once a year. And that also pointed towards the necessity, like what Asa said, of a better solution.

In so in all testaments, obviously, this has to be done like once a year, but that also points towards necessity to a better solution that can be done eternally. Once a year, that was a particular sacrifice, wasn't it? That was Yom Kippur, the day of atonement. But there were lots of other sacrifices as well, which could be carried out throughout the year, weren't there? And this all seems to be part of this

relationship with God. Is that the right way to put it? This is how a relationship with God was expressed. You know, if you did something wrong, you brought a sacrifice and the wrong was made right. In a way though, because I guess if you do look at Hebrews chapter 8, he quotes from Jeremiah.

which deals with this idea of God saying, I'm going to bring about a new covenant with you because the old one isn't doing what I hoped it to do. And part of the reason for that was that there was forgiveness for sins through these sacrifices, but it didn't really touch the heart or the conscience of a person. It was like cleansing the flesh, the outward body of a person. And you see that when you read the law, there's lots of stuff.

like regulations for what we do with our bodies and how we would cleanse them. And you've got this image, haven't you, of the blood of the sacrifice being sprinkled on the people. It's sort of outward though, isn't it? So it cleanses the flesh, but what does it do about the conscience of a person, their heart towards God and that internal aspect of our relationship with God? So, Ian, I think you wrote this about this in your

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devotionals in the Hebrews edition, didn't you? Let's maybe move on just a little bit to the difference between this Old Testament understanding of sacrifice and what the author of Hebrews is saying the sacrifice of Jesus did. What's the difference between them? I think there are many differences, but I think I would like to start from the common ground, what they both have in common. And I think when I read Hebrew

chapter 10 verse 1, which calls the Old Testament sacrificial system a shadow of the greater things to come. I think what it implies is that as part of God's redemptive plan, both the Old Testament and the New Testament ways, the Old Testament system was good, but not complete. And the coming of Jesus as the Messiah,

brought this plan to perfection by, if you like, filling the Old Testament sacrificial systems, mythological gaps. yeah, I think that there, if I may, I will want to elaborate by perhaps giving some examples. I think the first one, which is, I think quite familiar is Chinese brought up in a Confucian culture.

there's obviously a hierarchy there. we know only the high priest could enter the Holy of Holies. even then, just once a year on, as mentioned earlier, the date of the torment, and the rest of the people could not come into God's direct presence, relying instead on priests as sort of mediators. So this hierarchy emphasized on the separation between a holy God.

and sinful humanity. But Jesus torn down this hierarchical barrier and at his death, the veil, if remember from the book of John, the veil of the temple was torn into two, symbolizing the open access to God for everyone. I think as Hebrew, I think it's chapter 10 verse

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19-20, says, therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh. So I think this is just saying that through Jesus, every believer can approach God directly without fear. think the second

limitation of the old way of sacrifice is there's a time limit. And sacrifices had to be offered repeatedly, daily and annually. And they were never sufficient to fully atone for sin. And the Day of Atonement was an annual reminder of humanity's sinfulness, but it couldn't really provide a long lasting or eternal cleansing.

But on the other hand, Jesus' is once for all, unlike the repeated sacrifices of the Old Covenant. His offering on the cross was just final and complete, like what the Hebrew chapter 10 and 10 says. I think it's interesting if you think about the key elements in Old Testament sacrifices, let's say the high priests and the animal blood as two examples.

The high priests, they were on the top of the hierarchy, they could enter the Holy of Holies, but they were still human. They were subject to sin, they would die anyway, and they might fail. They had to offer sacrifices for their own sins before interceding for others. And if they made a mistake in the Holy of Holies, they could actually die. But Jesus, on the other hand, is the ultimate high priest.

He is perfect, he is eternal, and unlike these human priests, he is without sin. He lives forever to intercede for us. that's why I Hebrews 7, as I can remember, proclaims this permanent priesthood of Jesus Christ. I think similarly, animal sacrifices, animal blood, they are fine for a certain period of time, but they could never truly

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that West mentioned, to take our sins fully away. And it serves rather as a reminder of sins to the Israelites, but animals were not sufficient to cleanse a human heart and conscience. But Jesus' sacrifice is perfect because he offered himself willingly and himself was without sin. That's why his blood not only covered sin, but removed it.

unlike the animal blood, His blood removed our sins entirely and that was able to cleanse our conscience. But I think Jesus was really not turning the Old Testament sacrificial system down, but really serving as the missing pieces of the group. Yeah, I love that point you just made because I was sort of reading in the commentaries,

I think I've previously got confused about this, the way that Hebrews talks about it. The author isn't saying that the old covenant was wrong or bad. It was this good covenant that God made with his people, but it was sort of insufficient because of human weakness, basically. Not God's weakness, not God's failure, but our failure to keep our part of the covenant. And so that's why this

You know, it's like an even greater kindness of God, isn't it, to give us a new agreement where our failures and our weakness and sinfulness can't ruin the relationship with Him because He makes a way for us, you know, to have that relationship that He wants with us, that we can't mess up as long as we accept Jesus as our Savior, as long as we accept His sacrifice on our

I guess that's the only condition that's left, isn't it? Yeah, I think that's really interesting. Well, what you're both saying is really interesting, and it just made me think with this idea of the completion of the sort sacrificial system. I was just thinking about what it says in Hebrews 9 verses 11 and 12. When Christ came as the high priest of the good things that are already here,

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So that's the existing sacrificial system. He went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not man-made, i.e. the temple that was man-made, that is to say not a part of this creation. He did not enter by the means of the blood of goats and calves, but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood having obtained eternal redemption.

I think there he's drawing the contrast between the actions of the high priest who went into the most holy place once a year and Jesus' actions when he ascended into heaven after having been crucified and raised. And that was him entering into, if you like, the most holy place of all, the presence of God.

bringing himself as that sacrifice into the presence of God. So, the earthly temple and before that the tabernacle was kind of a reflection or an earthly representation of heaven where God really dwells. I guess where we, you know, in sort of churches today, because we don't have this old sacrificial system.

And therefore we sort of maybe lost the picture that God gave to the Israelites through this thing that they did on a regular basis. And then every year, the day of atonement, it was a picture reminding them of who God is, who they are in their standing before Him and the relationship. And yeah, I don't know how often I really think about that throne room of God. Hebrews talks about Jesus as sort of

This is a perpetual sacrifice that He's making on our behalf. It's ongoing. It's eternal. It is once for all. I'm not saying, you know, He dies again and again, but the effect of it is perpetual. And so, yeah, I don't know how often I've really thought about that as something that's actually happening in the heavens that is saving me, if you know what I mean? Well, no, and I agree. I mean, it's not something that really forms

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part of my daily understanding of this, but it's very biblical, isn't it? And this idea of the once and for all sacrifice, mean, that's quite liberating, isn't it? mean, think you've written about this as well, haven't you? And I think this is just the message of Gospel, isn't it? Because God loves us so much, He sent His only Son to die for us. And when that first

came across this message as a seeker, I just felt this didn't make sense. Why this perfect figure had to come from this sinful world? For us, who didn't actually, from every single aspect, deserve that level of love. But he did come. Jesus Christ has accomplished what the Testament foreshadowed.

as again what Hebrew 10 verse 1 said. it's only through his perfect sacrifice and blood that he sort of bridged this gap and offering this eternal redemption. And I think another important consequence for this, and that's what I see the difference between the Old Testament and New Testament sacrificial systems.

And the Old Testament, by saying as a shadow for the greater good, it's almost like you're the gospel, which is a priceless diamond in a PowerPoint slide. So explain again and again how great this thing is, how beautiful it is, how even useful it is to your salvation. But you don't have it in your real life. But what Jesus did was he paid a price.

and buy that jewelry for you and really give it to you in real life. And this is by His grace. You don't have to do anything. Whereas in the old Testament sacrificial system, you still have to offer. You need to be taking proactive steps. That's what I understand. To sort of meet the demand. But Jesus said that something

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The other way around, he came towards us so we can, by his grace, get the salvation, by ourselves, but through his work. think one of you used the word transactional earlier, and I think there is this element, isn't there, in the old sacrificial system. So if you do something,

that makes you okay with God and you'll do something else wrong. So, you have to do something and that makes you okay with God. as I see it, the difference is that whereas the Old Testament sacrificial system was transactional, the New Testament sacrifice of Jesus shifts the ground so that it becomes relational.

rather than transactional. So, it's more about living within a relationship than it is about doing particular things. Yeah. mean, maybe I feel like Hebrews chapter 10 verse 17, where he's again quoting from that Jeremiah passage, but instead of doing the whole passage that he did in chapter 8, he pulls out

just two aspects of it. And the second of them is, I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more. Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin. So it's that thing that you were kind of explaining, where before our sin was always before us. Now it's been dealt with.

And what that frees us up to do, he goes on to say that next section, at least in the ESV is kind of entitled the full assurance of faith. So instead of always sort of thinking, where am I in this cycle of sin and am I right before God? In Christ, we have this full assurance that we are right with him and that frees us up to live differently, like you say, to have a different kind of relationship with God.

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And I really quite like what he says in that passage, his encouragement to them about, you know, how they can go on to live now. He talks about them encouraging one another. This is in verse 24. It says, let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good work. So they're still doing something. They're still acting in ways that are loving. They're doing good works, but it's not out of this sort of fear.

Instead, it's sort of from a place of freedom. Yes, that's interesting. And that just makes me think of a question I was going to ask about whether we as Christians can slip back into that kind of transactional relationship with God. I mean, are we sometimes scared, too scared about doing the wrong thing, you know, because somehow God won't approve of us anymore? And I just wonder, are we sometimes motivated by guilt?

or fear rather than just by just a kind of normal trust in Him really. I think there might be something there for some people. I've got to admit I've got an awful lot from reading anti-rights commentary on Hebrews. One of the things he says about in this passage is, many Christian people still today forget that they're called to that kind of exuberant and joyful service.

free from any motivation caused by guilt or fear. And he asks, why do you suppose that such a liberating and healing message would be so hard to believe and remember? And I think that's quite a powerful question actually. Well, I think it's really interesting because we're talking about transactional trend. I hope not in a really negative way because if you

Even we call it transactional, I don't think it's necessarily inferior than a more relational pattern you saw in the New Testament narratives. Because even in the Testament era, if you read the Old Testament throughout, whether it be Isaiah or Leviticus, God actually, even within that seemingly transactional relationship, God always cared deeply.

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or let's say deeper about the heart behind the offerings, behind these seeming transactions. So as we said earlier, he actually rejected sacrifices when they became like empty rituals, disconnected from genuine faith and repentance. However, sins and our inherent weakness often reduced it to a sort of formality or cultural acts.

rather than a heartfelt devotion to God. So think it's the same thing somehow in both Old Testament and New Testament that what God's will lies in. It's not formality. It's not just the sacrifice, what kind of sacrifice we offer. It's really our heart whether we have that devotion to seek Him and to thank Him and to live.

by the Word of God. Yeah. I think that's so important to draw out because, you know, we can still become complacent about Jesus' sacrifice on our behalf. And I think that's something that the author of Hebrews goes on to point out. He talks in verse 26 about if we go on sinning deliberately, and there's a really stern warning in that section. Sinning deliberately, I think they mean like unrepentantly as well.

because we all do sin. But the heart that we show when we sin is really shows something about our relationship with God and the way we view Jesus' sacrifice on our behalf. Because unfortunately, we are still the same kind of weak, sinful humans that the Old Testament believers were. We still are going to mess up. For some reason, we just find obeying God so difficult, you know?

That fear that you talked about, that sense of guilt, well, we have somewhere we can go. We can go to our high priest, Jesus, who's made this perfect sacrifice on our behalf. We can repent and we can accept what he's done on our behalf and know that God will accept us. He's accepted Jesus' offering and he will accept us because of it. Yeah.

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And I think that's really important. I think we have to be so careful not to, you know, if we're Christians, we have to be so careful not to feel superior to people in the Old Testament or even to the Pharisees and the Sadducees and the sort of people who Jesus was at odds with during His life. Because it's always about what goes on in the heart, isn't it? And, you know, many of those Pharisees were really

devoted people and they kept the law as strictly as they did because they believed that that was what God wanted and they wanted to show their devotion to Him. I think that kind of leads me on to what I think is quite a difficult passage really in chapter 10 verses 26 to 29 where it suddenly gets quite threatening.

So Hebrews 10 verse 26, if we deliberately keep on sinning after we've received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and the raging fire that will consume the enemies of God. Anyone who rejected the law of Moses died without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much more severely do you think a man deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, who has

treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sacrificed him and who has insulted the spirit of grace. It's all pretty scary, isn't it? And I just wondered how we reacted to that. I was actually reading this passage in the morning and I just want to share a life story of myself, which I think might be relevant to hopefully aid interpretation of it.

So I think what's really powerful about the New Testament sacrificial logic is that, you know, in a transactional setting, which most other religions have, and it's a meritocracy where salvation has to be earned and measured by offerings and merits. But things, since Jesus did everything for us by grace now, and when we accept Jesus, it creates a direct bond between us and him. So it allows us to

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rely on his perfect righteousness to cover where we fall short. But I think the warning is that when we accept Jesus and when we know his power and his will, and we still see, we still drift away from that will, from him, and that will have even bigger consequences, know, comparing to if we don't know him.

So what I remember was when I was a kid, when I was in high school actually, I was so addicted to video games. That was like my sin, you know? And my dad, I was shortly before my uni entrance examination, my dad will set up rows and observe me from hours to basically on an hourly basis. And you know,

You know what? That was a time when we didn't have an idea of what child abuse is. So if I broke that rule, if I secretly played video game, he would slap me into that very intense video therapy session. And it didn't work actually. It definitely didn't work because, you know, I still could use my strategy to avoid that.

and play video games secretly. But there was one day, I remember very clearly, and he said to me, that's someone I show you something, because it was literally, think three or four months before the exam. And the first thing is actually a medical appointment letter from my mom. So my mom had a very severe back issue by then. And because he wanted to look after, she wanted to look after me.

cooking for me, all these sort of stuff before the exam, because it's quite quite a stressful period, obviously. She postponed that surgery for three times in a row. And the second thing he showed me was a big envelope. It was prepared by my grandma ever since I was born. She saved the money for almost 20 years so that when I

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went to college, went to uni, I could use that money to pay all the tuition.

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So at that time, I felt their love, I felt their sacrifice they made for me. And miraculously, immediately, I gave up on all the video games I played. Wow, because that moment, I could feel what they felt. And almost created, you know, but not almost,

did create a unity that not only this is not any longer ruled by laws between me and my dad, but when I really felt what it felt, I can really understand what this whole thing is all about. I can understand it's a sacrifice. It helped me to really follow.

and to understand where I fall short previously. I think it's somehow the same. When in Old Testament era, we rely upon ourselves, it really didn't work. But when we really accept Jesus, we can actually rely on Jesus, rely on the guidance of the Holy Spirit. This is a different issue. But I remember one time, I think one or two weeks before the exam, I got

bit strange feeling I could play some more games just make myself relaxed and I did it again and my dad found out he didn't say even one word he just turned his back to me and walked away that made me 1,000 times more nervous than if he had slapped me

Because I know, you know, when he stabbed me, that's actually an action showing he still wanted to accept me back to the family by the stab that actually says your crimes, the crimes you committed are okay because that you, we had a transaction if you like. But when he knew I know everything, I knew the...

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sacrifice of my mom and grandma and I still did it. We walked away. And that image, I saw his back moving further, further towards me and shut the door closed. That was scary. So I know there's a distance between him and me that would take extra steps to shorten.

Yeah, that's so powerful that you shared that. And I guess, you know, in our sort of human family, so that is a place where we really feel what should be a close relationship, and we really feel distance in that relationship very keenly. And it is such a picture, isn't it? Our family, that kind of God can use to try and illustrate.

know, maybe our relationship with Him and with His Son. Because if we did see, you know, our sort of slipping up and our failures and that, you know, continually doing things that we know cause Jesus' pain. Yeah, if we could feel keenly what we've, the pain we've caused Him and know completely the sacrifice that He's made on our behalf.

It's something that we really need to grasp, isn't it? And then a passage like this, which I think the way you read it, Mark, it certainly sounded very like you used the word threatening. But I think what he's trying to get across is the seriousness of this and the impact of it. And yeah, I don't think it's meant to be this sort of horrible, mean threat.

It's meant to be like, look, see what you're doing. See the relationship you have. What are you going to do about this? Are you going to behave in this way? Or, you know, are you going to persevere? Live that life of faith and obedience that has been modeled for you and receive the promise that you've been given, this covenant that I've made with you, this eternal life. Or are you going to walk away from all of that?

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I think he just really wants us to grasp that. think that's right. I'm sure you're right. And I read it that way deliberately because that's what it looks like. You know, if you read it just like that on the page, that's how it comes across. But I think that in that story just illustrates it so beautifully. I'm so glad that you've told it to us. I think we will sort of draw things to a close here, but I did want to just offer something to you as a way of

Kind of wrapping this up in a way, and that's from chapter 10 verses 19 to, well, it goes through to verse 35. I'm not going to read the whole thing, but basically the writer, he says, therefore, since we have confidence to enter the most holy place by the blood of Jesus, etc., etc., etc., and going through the sacrifice of Jesus for us, since we have a great high priest over the house of God. So it begins with a therefore.

and that's always significant. And then there are some consequences and there are three, let us consequences. So it's basically let us draw near to God, let's hold unswervingly to the hope we profess and let's consider how we can spur each other on towards love and good deeds. And as a preacher, I read that and I thought that's a perfect three-point sermon, but I just thought that was a brilliant way of

of this writer summing up what for him it's all about. Everything he's been talking about, about the sacrifice of Jesus compared to Old Testament sacrifices, this is what it's about, these three lettuce clauses. Okay, well, thank you again. Thank you, Esther. I think we've really enjoyed talking this subject through and I hope you've all enjoyed listening to it.

If you want more content like this, should consider subscribing to the Rooted Devotional Journal, where you'll get a daily devotional journal sent to you every other month. Find out more at biblesociety.org.uk forward slash rooted. And if you enjoyed hearing the podcast, please share it with your friends, leave us a review or do get in touch. We always enjoy hearing from you, whether that's in the comments of YouTube or Spotify or via our questions form, which is biblesociety.org.uk.

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And we will be back next week with Noah in charge for our next episode on Hebrews. Thanks very much.