But when this Priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, He sat down at the right hand of God. Sermons
I. THE SACRIFICE OFFERED BY CHRIST. 1. Self-sacrifice. The Jewish priests offered goats, lambs, etc. But Jesus Christ "gave himself." The whole of his life upon earth was a sacrifice. The sufferings of the closing scenes were sacrificial. His death was sacrificial. In all he acted with entire spontaneity (John 10:17, 18). All was the outcome of the infinite love wherewith he loved us. It is of the very nature of love to sacrifice self for the beloved. No sacrifice is so Divine as that of self. "Greater love hath no man than this," etc. (John 15:13). 2. Self-sacrifice for sin. The death of Jesus was neither (1) a mere martyrdom; nor (2) an offering to pacify the wrath of God; but (3) it was a "sacrifice for sins." "He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." "Christ also suffered for sins once, the righteous for the unrighteous," etc. 3. Self-sacrifice for sin of perpetual efficacy. "He offered one sacrifice for sins for ever." Christ's sacrifice was offered once for all It needs no repetition. It is completely efficacious for all sins of all men for ever (cf. Hebrews 9:25-28). It seems to us that to speak of "offering Christ upon the altar" in the Lord's Supper is utterly unscriptural, and a reflection on the sufficiency of the "one sacrifice for sins forever" which our Lord offered. II. THE POSITION OCCUPIED BY CHRIST. "Sat down on the right hand of God." This position is suggestive of: 1. Rest. The sitting down is opposed to the standing of the preceding verse. Christ's sacrificial work is completed. The sufferings of his earthly life are over forever. The toil and conflict are all past. He has finished the work that was given him to do (cf. Hebrews 1:3). 2. Honor. "The right hand" is the position of honor. He is "crowned with glory and honor" (Hebrews 2:9; cf. Philippians 2:6-11). The glory of redemption is his. 3. His exaltation is a guarantee that all who are one with hire in sacrifice shall be one with him in sovereignty. There is a cross for each of his disciples; there is also a crown for every one who faithfully bears that cross (cf. Matthew 16:24; John 12:26; Romans 8:17; Revelation 3:21). III. THE EXPECTATION ENTERTAINED BY CHRIST. "From henceforth expecting till his enemies be made the footstool of his feet." The foes of our Lord are rebellious angels and rebellious men. All persons and all things which are opposed to his character and sovereignty are his enemies. Ignorance, the darkness of the mind, is opposed to him as "the Light" and "the Truth." Tyranny is opposed to him as the great Emancipator. He proclaimed the universal brotherhood of men. Sin is opposed to him as the Savior and the Sovereign of men. Death is opposed to him as the Life and the Lifegiver. All these he will completely and for ever vanquish. "He must reign till he hath put all his enemies under his feet." Let us endeavor to realize the certainty of this. 1. History points to it. During nearly nineteen centuries the spirit and the principles of Christ have been advancing and gaining strength in the world. Tyrannical despotisms passing away; free governments spreading; slavery losing its place and power; liberty and the recognition of human brotherhood constantly growing; cruelties and oppressions ever decreasing; Christian charities and generosities ever increasing; the night of ignorance receding; the day of intelligence advancing and brightening. The past is prophetic of the complete triumph of Christ. 2. The spirit of the age points to it. There is much of evil in the age; but there are also many good and hope-inspiring things. The age is one of broadening freedom, earnest inquiry, growing intelligence, and many and ever-increasing charities. All these are in harmony with Christianity, results of Christianity; and as men advance in them they will be the more fitted and disposed to embrace Christianity. 3. God's Word assures it. (See Psalm 2:8; Psalm 72:8-17; Daniel 7:13, 14.) 4. Christ is waiting for it. "From henceforth expecting" - implying his undoubted assurance of it. He cannot be disappointed. - W.J.
This Man, after He had offered. Homilist. I. THE PAST ERA OF CHRIST'S REDEMPTIVE HISTORY. He has "offered one sacrifice for sins."1. Christ's death was a self-immolation. (1) (2) 2. His death was a self-immolation for sin. He died to put away sin: to put it away in its guilt-form — in its idea-form — and in its habit-form. His death was a self-immolation for sin unrepeatable. "One... for ever." Sufficient for all lands and ages. II. THE PRESENT:ERA OF CHRIST'S REDEMPTIVE HISTORY. "Sat down at the right hand of God." 1. Rest. 2. Heaven. III. THE FUTURE ERA OF CHRIST'S REDEMPTIVE HISTORY. "From henceforth expecting," &c. 1. Christ has enemies. Fallen angels and sinful men. 2. These enemies He will subjugate. Some will be subdued by the moral influences of His truth and love; and some by the resistless might of His retributive justice. Lessons: 1. The repugnance with which humanity should regard sin. 2. The true test by which we may determine the worth of our Christianity. The absence of sin. 3. The certainty of Christianity's ultimate triumph. 4. The absurdity of waiting for any further helps to conversion. (Homilist.) 1. One sacrifice serves for all God's Church — not only one priest, but one offering. 2. This one offering of Christ serves effectually for all God's Church. Not only are all His people cleansed, they are all fully and eternally cleansed, by it. II. We must now follow our Lord INTO HEAVEN. The text carries Him there in His human nature; and more than that — in the character He bore here in His human nature, the great Expiator of our sins. The apostle's language intimates to us — 1. The repose of Christ in heaven, a repose indicating the completeness and perfection of the work He had performed on earth. 2. The high exaltation of Christ in heaven. (C. Bradley, M. A.) 1. He offered His body (Isaiah 1.6; PEa. 69:21; Isaiah 52:14). These were sufferings of no common kind. 2. But, in suffering, He offered His mind. The sufferings of our Redeemer's soul must be considered as the soul of His sufferings. 3. He offered in sacrifice His glory — by which we understand how glory will follow up the shame. Now, our Redeemer's feelings were not blunted or stoical — nay, they were delicately fine; and when they called Him " a deceiver of the people," "a glutton, and a wine-bibber"; when they said He had a devil — that He was not fit to live: He must have felt the indignity with great acuteness. 4. He offered in sacrifice the consolations of heaven's protection (Matthew 27:46). 5. He offered in sacrifice His life (John 15:13; Romans 5:8). 6. He offered in sacrifice His will. He prayed that the cup of suffering might pass from Him (Matthew 26:42); yet He gave His person into the hands of those who put it to torture: He voluntarily resigned Himself to that train of overwhelming and distressing ideas, that threw His mind into an agony and bathed Him in a bloody sweat. II. FOR WHAT PURPOSE DID HE OFFER THIS SACRIFICE? Whenever we think, or read, about the sufferings of Christ, we are immediately directed to sin (1 Corinthians 15:3; 1 Peter 3:18; 1 Peter 2:24; Isaiah 53:5). This Man offered Himself a sacrifice for sin — 1. To avert the consequences of it. Jesus Christ paid the penalty, that He might deliver the sinner from the consequences of his sins. 2. He died that He might remove the presence of sin, by doing away the love of it; by cleansing the guilty in the" fountain opened for sin and uncleanness," — rendering the person " without spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing." 3. He offered Himself a sacrifice to overcome the forfeiture of sin. III. THE EXALTATION OF OUR REDEEMER. 1. This was through the medium of His resurrection. 2. And He has now " sat down at the right hand of God." God is a great and invisible Spirit, with whom literally there can be neither standing nor recumbency. We must, therefore, understand this phrase figuratively; and it is — (1) (2) (3) IV. THE PURPOSES OF HIS WILL SHALL BE FULFILLED. Of the adversaries of Jesus Christ we observe — 1. That Satan is the most subtle, ancient, and formidable. 2. Error. Error may be said to be a hydra with many heads. These systems degrade God's creatures, rob the Redeemer, murder the souls of men; and as such they must come down: by the general diffusion of knowledge, by the spread of the Scriptures, by the piety of God's people. 3. Another enemy is to be found in wicked, unconverted men. But these enemies shall be the footstool of the "Lion of the tribe of Judah." Upon unconverted men, Jesus Christ will employ His gospel on their understandings, and His Spirit on their consciences, and His providence on their circumstances and their bodies; and these weapons shall be " mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds." 4. Another enemy of Christ is death. He is said to be the last enemy that shall be destroyed (1 Corinthians 15:26). 5. All these enemies have been made by one worse than the devil himself, and that enemy is sin. To destroy sin the Son of God was manifested — for this purpose He offered Himself a sacrifice — for this purpose He has commanded His gospel to be preached to every creature — for this purpose He is, at this moment, seated at the right hand of God, invested with all power, to employ whatever instrument He thinks proper, and to give a blessing to those means that they may be effectual.Application: 1. Here we discover the character of sinners. They are said to be enemies to Christ. 2. We learn, again, that these unconverted persons must be His footstool, whether at home or abroad. Will you be conquered by the sceptre of His grace; or will you be broken in pieces by the iron rod of His wrath? 3. We see the duty of the people to extend by conquest the triumphs of the Redeemer: to bring home His rebel outcasts, that they may be saved from sin and Satan's snare. (W. Atherton.) 1. He accomplished what all others failed to do. 2. He accomplished what none others need attempt after Him. II. Is His RELATION TO HEAVEN. 1. Enjoyment of tranquil repose. 2. Elevation to highest honour. 3. Execution of universal power. III. IN HIS RELATION TO THE MILLENNIUM. 1. He has opponents. 2. His enemies are in process of subjugation. 3. His ultimate supremacy will be complete. (B. D. Johns.) II. THE PERMANENT SUFFERING OF THE INNOCENT AND BENEVOLENT REDEEMER WOULD DEFEAT THE VERY END OF ATONEMENT. That end is, to diminish suffering in the universe. If we are to be saved at the eternal expense of such a Being; if He is to be for ever buffeted and spit upon, while we are crowned with glory; if He is to sink under the Father's frown, while we rejoice in the light of His countenance — then the cost is too great. To awaken the most generous sentiments in the hearts of the redeemed, and to sustain them, Christ must be rewarded with everlasting honour and joy. To enjoy heaven by the continued sufferings of our Friend and Redeemer, would make us selfish; to see His sufferings, and not be selfish, would make our own happiness impossible. (E. N. Kirk, D. D.) (W. J. Dawson.) 1. He has done all that was necessary to make an atonement and an end of sin. He has done so much, that it never will be needful for Him again to be crucified. Oh! if the last thread had not been woven in the great garment of our righteousness, He would be spinning it now; if the last particle of our .debt had not been paid, He would be counting it down now; and if all were not complete, He would never rest, until, like a wise builder, He had laid the top-stone of the temple of our salvation. No; the very fact that He sits still, and rests, proves that His work is finished. 2. And then note again, that His sitting at the right hand of God implies that He enjoys pleasure; for at God's right hand "there are pleasures for evermore." Now I think the fact that Christ enjoys infinite pleasure has in it some degree of proof that He must have finished His work. He has joys as God; but as the man-God, His joys spring from the salvation of the souls of men. That is His joy, which is full, in the thought that He has finished His work and has cut it short in righteousness. I think there is some degree of proof, although not, perhaps, positive proof there, that Jesus must have finished His work. 3. The fact that it is said He has sat down for ever proves that He must have. done it. Christ has undertaken it to save all the souls of the elect. If He has not already saved them, He is bound to do something that will save them, for He has given solemn promise to His Father, that He will bring many souls unto glory. 4. Yet, the best proof is, that Christ sits at His Father's right hand at all. For the very fact that Christ is in heaven, accepted by His Father, proves that His work must be alone. Why, as long as an ambassador from our country is at a foreign court, there must be peace; and as long as Jesus Christ our Saviour is at His Father's court, it shows that there is real peace between His people and His Father. Well, as He will be there for ever, that shows that our peace must be continual. But that peace could not have been continual, unless the atonement had been wholly made, unless justice had been entirely satisfied; and, therefore, from that very fact it becomes certain that the work of Christ must be done. II. THE GLORY WHICH HE HAS ASSUMED. "After He had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right-hand of God." Now, by this you are to understand the complex person of Christ; for Christ, as God, always was on His Father's throne; He always was God; and even when He was on earth He was still in heaven. But Jesus Christ, as the man-God, has assumed honours which once He had not; for as man, He did not at one time sit on His Father's throne; He was a suffering man; but as God-man He has assumed a dignity next to God; He sits at the right hand of the glorious Trinity. 1. From this we gather, that the dignity which Christ now enjoys is surpassing dignity. There is no dignity to be compared to that of Christ. 2. In the next place, Christ has real dignity. Some persons have mere empty titles, which confer but little authority. But the man-Christ Jesus, while He has many crowns and many titles, has not one tinsel crown or one empty title. He overruleth all mortal things, making the evil work a good, and the good produce a better, and a better still, in infinite progression. 3. And once more: this honour that Christ hath received (I mean the Man-God Christ) was deserved honour; that dignity which His Father gave Him He well deserved. 4. We must consider the exaltation of Christ in heaven as being in some degree a representative exaltation. Christ Jesus exalted at the Father's right hand, though He has eminent glories, in which the saints must not expect to share, essentially He is the express image of the person of God, and the brightness of His Father's glory, yet, to a very great degree, the honours which Christ has in heaven He has as our representative there. III. WHAT ARE CHRIST'S EXPECTATIONS? 1. We are told, He expects that His enemies shall be made His footstool. In some sense that is already done; the foes of Christ are, in some sense, His footstool now. What is the devil but the very slave of Christ, for he doth no more than he is permitted against God's children? What are wicked men but the servants of God's providence, unwittingly to themselves? In that sense all things are now Christ's. 2. But we expect greater things than these at His coming, when all enemies shall be beneath Christ's feet upon earth. We are, therefore, many of us, "looking for that blessed hope; that glorious appearing of the kingdom of our Saviour Jesus Christ"; many of us are expecting that Christ will come; we cannot tell you when; we believe it to be folly to pretend to guess the time, but we are expecting that even in our life the Son of God will appear, and we know that when He shall appear He will tread His foes beneath His feet, and reign from pole to pole, and from the river even to the ends of the earth. 3. Christ will have all His enemies put beneath His feet, in that great day of judgment. Oh I that will be a terrible putting of His foes beneath His feet, when at the second resurrection the wicked dead shall rise; when the ungodly shall stand before His throne, and His voice shall say, "Depart, ye cursed." (C. H. Spurgeon.) (A. B. Davidson, LL. D.) 1. From the fact that God has established and introduced it to human knowledge. 2. From its interior structure, its fitness to man, the reply which it gives to His deepest demands. 3. From the fact that the supremacy of Christianity will nobly complete the circle of history; will give unity, wholeness to the annals of the race, and will show through their courses a sublime method. 4. The specific declarations of God in the Scriptures assure us of that result. 5. The historic progress of Christianity among men, with the nature of the arena on which it now acts, gives assurance of its supremacy. How then ought its friends to labour for Christianity, to spread its truth, its promise, and life I How vividly also does this last thought come to us: the personal obligation of each of us to submit from the heart to Christ's dominion. The ancient legend of the Church, that Julian died exclaiming as he expired, "Galilean, Thou hast conquered," is certain to be realised in the substance of its history in every soul not submitted to Christ. His rule at last shall be complete, and the period of that sway shall compass eternity. In that last and glorious age there will be found no place on earth, no place in heaven for him who hath not bowed to Christ! The dominion of Messiah hath no promises for him. (R. S. Storrs, D. D.) (A. Bax.) (A. Bax.) (J. Fleming, D. D.) 2069 Christ, pre-eminence 1352 covenant, the new 6606 access to God 6745 sanctification, nature and basis 2336 Christ, exaltation Twenty-Eighth Day. The Way into the Holiest. Twenty-Sixth Day. Holiness and the Will of God. June the Fourteenth the Law in the Heart Provoking Each Other to Love and Good Works. The Death of the Saviour the End of all Sacrifices. The Exercise of Mercy Optional with God. The Only Atoning Priest Christ Exalted Perfection in Faith Hebrews x. 26, 27 The Inward Laws Like one of Us. Getting Ready to Enter Canaan A Farewell The Roman Conflagration and the Neronian Persecution. Brought Nigh An Advance in the Exhortation. The Saints' Privilege and Profit; Seventeenth Day. Holiness and Crucifixion. Your Own Salvation A visit to the Harvest Field Brought up from the Horrible Pit The Rent Veil |