Hebrews / Christ’s Once-for-All Sacrifice in the Heavenly Sanctuary

Christ’s Once-for-All Sacrifice in the Heavenly Sanctuary

Hebrews 9:11-28

Chapter 9

¹¹ But Christ, having arrived as high priest of the good things that have come to be, through the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands—that is, not of this creation— ¹² nor by the blood of goats and bulls, but by his own blood, he entered once for all into the holy things, having found eternal redemption. ¹³ For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer, when sprinkled on the defiled, sanctify them for the purity of the flesh, ¹⁴ By how much more will the blood of Jesus Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our conscience from dead works to worship the living God. ¹⁵ And for this reason he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that, death having taken place for redemption of the transgressions under the first covenant, those who are called might receive the promise of the eternal inheritance. ¹⁶ For where a covenant is, the death of the one who made the covenant must be borne. ¹⁷ For a covenant is valid over dead bodies, since it never has force when the one who made it lives. ¹⁸ Therefore neither the first covenant has been inaugurated without blood. ¹⁹ For when every commandment had been spoken according to the Law by Moses to all the people, he took the blood of the calves with water and scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book and all the people. ²⁰ saying, "This is the blood of the covenant which God commanded toward you." ²¹ Indeed, he sprinkled the tabernacle and all the vessels of the ministry in the same way with the blood. ²² And almost everything is purified with blood according to the law, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. ²³ Therefore, there is indeed necessity for the patterns of the heavenly things to be cleansed with these, but the heavenly realm itself with superior sacrifices than these. ²⁴ For Christ did not enter made-with-hands holy things, copies of the true ones, but into heaven itself, now to appear before the face of God for us. ²⁵ nor that he might offer himself often, just as the high priest enters the holy things every year with the blood of another, ²⁶ for then he would have had to suffer many times from the foundation of the world; but now once at the consummation of the ages, for the setting aside of sin through his sacrifice, he has been manifested. ²⁷ And just as it is appointed for humans to die once, but after this, judgment. ²⁸ so also Christ, once having been offered to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, without sin, to those who eagerly expect him for salvation.