His Hand is on the Door

When was the law rescinded? (Pt. 1)

November 14th, 2007

rescind: tr.v. To make void; repeal or annul. (American Heritage Dictionary)

Let’s consider a question today, which may or may not have an obvious solution (depending on the stream of church culture you hail from). When was the law nullified?

The idea that the law is nullified is drawn primarily from the book of Hebrews, specifically in chapters 8-10. Most pointedly, in coming to “the main point of things” (Heb. 8:1) and beginning to talk about the inferiority of the “first covenant” (Heb. 8:7). To the point, the writer begins to establish a framework for the superiority of the new covenant: “In that He says, ‘A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.” (Heb. 8:13) What is vanishing away, and when did it happen?

The immediate answer for most would be, of course, at the cross. The once-for-all-time sacrifice of Jesus - the shedding of guiltless blood from a Spotless Lamb, justified us before God and provided for the atonement of all of our sins. Our hearts have been sprinkled from an evil conscience - our damaged consciences have been renewed, in other words. This act of God’s mercy makes us miserable sinners whenever we violate that restored conscience. Also, our bodies have been washed with pure water - we have been purified by the blood of Christ. The writer of Hebrews, in chapter 10, is using Temple imagery to help the first century Messianic reader grasp the awesomeness of the superior sacrifice of the God-Man.

The Day of Atonement

In other words, our outward and inward man has been cleansed and a new and living way has been consecrated for us by which we can now do what only one man could do one time a year: enter into the “Holiest” - the Holy of Holies. To prepare to enter this most sacred and fearsome of inner chambers, Israel’s High Priest would wash his body five times that morning! He would then wash his hands and feet in preparation for the morning sacrifices. Later in the day, he would wash his hands and feet again, change clothes (from golden to white garments, take another bath, and then put on the white garments (Lev. 16:4). If you are counting, we’re up to six full washings and two extra hand / feet washings.

The High Priest would then offer a bull to the Lord for himself and his household before proceeding; then he would cast lots and choose from between two goats; one to sacrifice and one to bear the sins of the people (the scapegoat). He would now kill the young bull he had offered up to the Lord, then walk up to the ramp to the altar and fill a gold censer with coals and a gold ladle with incense (Lev. 16:12; Rev. 8:1-5) before walking into the Most Holy Place. He would hang the censer before the ark and throw the incense into it, creating a cloud of sweet, fragrant smoke before the ark (representing the throne of God).

Once the incense was found acceptable to the Lord (in other words, the High Priest did not die), the High Priest would then come out from behind the veil and take the blood of the slain bull (which someone had to stir repeatedly up to this point so that it would not coagulate). Returning to the Holiest, he would sprinkle the blood with his finger once upward towards the mercy seat before sprinkling blood seven times downward. Then the goat would be slain. Taking its blood in a basin into the Holiest, the High Priest would again sprinkle the blood eight times. Taking both basins of blood (from the bull and the goat), he would then sprinkle blood outside of the chamber (to purify it), which would mean sixteen more sprinklings; he would then mix the two basins together and sprinkle blood onto the horns of the altar before sprinkling blood seven more times on the altar of incense.

The rest of the ceremony involved sending out (and pushing off of a cliff) the scapegoat and the gutting and burning (outside of the city) of the bull and first goat. The High Priest would wash his hands and feet, change clothes, then wash his hands and feet again. It was time for the afternoon sin offering. The evening sacrifice (and one more bath and two more hand and feet washings) would come later. In other words, the day of atonement of the sins of a nation was not sufficient to last even a few minutes and a few hours before more sacrifices were required. This is what the writer of Hebrews was reminding the compromising Jews who should have known better when he wrote: “And every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.” (Hebrews 10:11)

Once for All Time to Draw Near

With “one offering”, Jesus perfected forever those who are being sanctified (Heb. 10:14). As one watches Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ”, it is shocking how much blood is shed, particularly during the beating and scourging of Jesus. It is almost unbearable to watch. Yet the amount of blood sprinkled throughout the ceremony by the High Priest was a foreshadowing of what Jesus would endure for the sins of the world. These sacrifices, being the “shadow of good things to come”, can never make those who approach the Lord perfect - “it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins.” (Heb. 10:4) This impossibility, again, was personified by the two daily, regular sin offerings that had to follow the special day of atonement for the nation.

So, the point is driven home by the writer of Hebrews - the insufficient sacrifices were taken away. He says definitively:

8 Previously saying, “Sacrifice and offering, burnt offerings, and offerings for sin You did not desire, nor had pleasure in them” (which are offered according to the law), 9 then He said, “Behold, I have come to do Your will, O God.” He takes away the first that He may establish the second. 10 By that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. (Hebrews 10:8-10)

What was taken away, once for all time? Was it the whole of the law, “having a shadow of good things to come”? No! The shadow that is within the law is the sacrificial system - specifically in this passage, the Day of Atonement. That day is the singular focus of this passage, but the writer is clear that all sacrifices and offerings are taken away so that the will of God could be established to sanctify and purify the Jew - and all the peoples of the nations - to draw near to the Holiest through faith. This confession of hope is one that the Jewish believers of that day were exhorted to “hold fast” to unwaveringly. They had been “forsaking the assembling of ourselves together” and returning to the Temple sacrifices publicly as a means of staving off great social and familial pressure to conform again to Temple Judaism as the means to their atonement. This, according to the writer of Hebrews, was willful sin (Heb. 10:26).

Part two to follow…

David

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