Hebrews chapter 8 is where we’re going to be together today, and I want you to know this. You know a lot of times you want to preach a message in a way that just is exciting and exuberates the beauty of what a passage is, and I hope that comes across today, but I want you to know my ultimate goal in all that we’re going to declare related to Hebrews chapter 8 is that the content of what this section of scripture is about would resonate in your life the rest of your days as you follow Jesus. This, chapter 8, chapter 9, chapter 10, for me was the pinnacle in understanding what the New Testament is about as it relates to the Old Testament. It puts the whole picture of scripture together and it speaks very broadly, very powerfully into religious mentality, and it shows us how the Old Testament really fits into what the New Testament is about, and helps us to put what the Old Testament explains into perspective as we walk in light of being followers of Christ.
This section of scripture, and I think the whole book is dealing with a people group, the book of Hebrews written to the Jewish people, who are used to a particular religious way of living. Now it’s calling them into what we are going to refer to in this section as the new covenant. We talked a little bit about that next week, but this new covenant is a new way of living in light of what Jesus has done for them. This was a difficult way, this is a paradigm shift in the mind in what they were familiar with in their lives to where they are today.
There are over 1400 years of this religious expression of living and in that religious expression of living, they began in the first century to really see it, and even before that system bringing about their righteousness. It was a mistake in their way of thinking and what God wanted to ultimately achieve, but Jesus came and he started to speak into that for them. In fact, Jesus said things like this in Mark chapter 2, verse 22, “You can’t put new wine in old wineskins,” in reference to the Old Testament and New Testament.
When Jesus came and started preaching, they looked at their old system and tried to figure out how Jesus sort of fit on top of that. You see that throughout the whole New Testament. They keep trying to put Jesus in this Levitical system and understanding how Christ can just be an add-on to what they were already familiar with. Jesus says you can’t put new wine in old wineskins, the reason being is because new wine is still going through fermentation. You put it in the old wineskin, the old wineskin’s already met its capacity of stretching, and it’s just going to burst and it’s going to ruin the old wineskin and destroy the new wine.
Jesus went on to say throughout the gospels in John chapter 5, verse 39, showing how the law and the prophets, everything culminated in him. He said the same thing in Luke 22:27. The strangers on the road to Emmaus. It says he starts walking the street with them and showing them how everything culminated in who he was. So Hebrews chapter 8 is that paradigm shift in the way of thinking and seeing the sufficiency of all that Christ is. This chapter sort of becomes the plateau and the explanation to the sufficiency of Jesus in all of our lives.
Change is difficult. Change for any of us is difficult. But here’s the beauty of Jesus. He brings that change within you, if you would but surrender to him. This book of Hebrews is the explanation of religious freedom to finally living free for which God has created us to do in him. So he starts chapter 8, verse 1, “Now the main point,” sort of makes me think that he’s about to make a main point, right?
“Now the main point in what has been said is this. We have such a high priest who has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne and the majesty in the heavens.” God started a theme in Hebrews chapter 5 that he’s continued all the way into chapter 8, and he’s going to continue it beyond this point, but it’s the identity of Jesus being the ultimate priest in who he represents to us. As he begins to describe this main point, in Jesus being now our high priest, we have such a high priest, he then describes him this way.
“Taking his seat at the right hand of the throne in the majesty in the heavens.” Now here’s the uniqueness of the declaration they’re making about Jesus. We’re going to look at this next week. We’re going to talk about the idea of the temple. Beautiful section of scripture and what the temple’s intended to represent to us, but when you think about the context of the temple and all that God has described and the different furniture and the settings for the temple, there is one thing that did not exist in the temple. That was a seat for the priest to set themselves in order to take a break. Never happened.
When a priest was on duty in the temple, they were always working, always making sacrifice for sin. They were always busy. It’s the demonstration that no matter how much they had performed within the context of this temple, it was never going to be enough. But here in Hebrews 8:1, the uniqueness of what it says about Jesus, is he takes a seat. He rests. He’s resting in the sufficiency of what he has performed for you on the cross.
In fact, if you were just to look at the previous chapter, at the very end of this book in verse, chapter 7 and verse 27, it says this, “Who does not need daily, like those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins and then for the sins of the people because this he did once for all when he offered up himself.” So it’s acknowledging the priest within the temple having to do these sacrifices for themselves, for the people constantly, never being able to rest. When was enough enough?
The answer is in Jesus. He sits down. His work is complete. That’s what it’s saying to you. The sufficiency of his accomplishment, it is complete. So when you think about your position before God and you look at it in the religious context, there is this gauntlet of just running the marathon over and over, wondering if God is ever pleased by what you are doing and what you have done with your life, and then there’s Jesus. Just resting.
I mean you know what that’s like right? To labor all day long? You get home and you just think before the kids just start with what they’re going to say because I know they’re going to get me up in about five minutes with some emergency or something that’s happened. I just want to get to that spot on the couch, right? That spot where long after you’re gone, we can probably take an imprint of where you sat. At least your rump can be reconstructed because you know exactly where your spot is. That one spot in your home where you just go and you sit down and you just sort of decompress in that position, where you just, you sink and the couch becomes one with you. You know what I’m talking about where just anything, in all your day, if you could just get to that one spot for just five minutes, right?
Here it is, Jesus. His work is sufficient. Not only does it say in this verse that he is resting, but it also recognizes the position of his place. Something interesting to do, if you ever study scripture is when you read the New Testament especially, recognize the posture of Jesus. Oftentimes it will describe him in one of two ways. He’s either standing or sitting. When he’s standing, it’s recognizing usually the welcoming of the saints, like when Stephen was martyred in Acts chapter 7. It says he looks up into the heavens and he sees Jesus standing at the right hand of the Father, which is a figurative statement. It’s saying he’s in the position of approval.
In our culture, we talk about people being the right hand man or the person of favor. I’d cut off my right arm if I could just keep them. That special individual in your life. When it’s talking about Jesus, it’s carrying that same identity and this theme that he’s at the right hand of the father. Positionally he’s in the place of favor for you and I. Resting in his accomplished work for you.
It says to us here in Jesus being the perfect priest, it goes on in verse 2, a minister in the sanctuary in the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, not man. So now explains this priestly idea. If you were to go back in the book of Exodus, you would start to read in chapter 16, 17, the appointing of the priests. Then in the appointing of the priests, there’s this giving of the law and construction of the temple. He’s really following that theme in the book of Hebrews. That there’s this priest, this priest that exercises the law and most particularly in the temple, the temple becomes essential for the work of the priest which is very significant to understand as it relates to the Old Testament because when you go back into Old Testament days, in Daniel chapter 9, verses 24 to 27, it tells us that the messiah’s going to come. When the messiah is come, he will be cut off, and then shortly after that, the temple is destroyed.
You look in Jewish history today, and since 70 AD there has not been a temple. For almost 2000 years, there has been no ability to practice this, but yet God prophesied before the coming of the messiah that that would take place, so that we could see the sufficiency of who that is. He’s beginning to say in verse 2, that this is the true tabernacle. Now wait a minute, right? Old Testament you have a priest. You have the law. You have the temple. What are they beginning to say here? That in regards to the temple which God had us build on earth, is that just chopped liver in comparison to what’s being talked about in this verse?
He’s saying that Jesus is ministering in this place. He wants us to understand in verse 3 and 4, what exactly that means and how he’s able to do that. So look at this. He says for every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices. That’s what they did in the temple. So it was necessary that this high priest, talking about Jesus also have something to offer. Jesus said in the giving of his life, this new covenant, this cup of the new covenant is in my what? Blood.
Jesus is demonstrating to his disciples in Luke chapter 22 and verse 20, that he is giving his life as that sacrifice for the new covenant in his blood, so in verse 3, Jesus has become that sacrifice just like the priest in the Old Testament had a sacrifice to give. Now verse 4, now if he were on earth, he would not be a priest at all, since there are those who offer the gifts according to the law. We talked about this last week. How can Jesus be a priest when he’s not a Levite? Well he’s a priest after the order of Melchizedek. If you want to know what that means, go back and read last week, but it’s acknowledging yes, Jesus couldn’t operate in the temple on earth because Jesus didn’t hold the position as a Levite in which to do it.
But he goes on verse 7 and starts to share then how Jesus is able to do what is being described in the offering of his life. He says this. “They’re offering gifts according to the law who serve a copy and a shadow of the heavenly things, just as Moses was warned by God when he was about to erect the tabernacle. For see,” he says, “That you make all things according to the pattern which was shown you on the mountain.”
What’s the author alluding to here? He’s saying to us that God in fact did call Moses to build a temple. But as God called the priests in the book of Exodus, 16, 17 and on, he begins to give the law then in chapter 20. As he calls Moses on the mountain and the giving of the law, he starts to share with Moses in the building of the temple in Exodus 25, verse 40, that the temple which Moses was to build was a shadow of something greater.
Now what we know in just living life is that a shadow cannot exist in and of itself. It’s a reflection of something more. Even from the Mosaic law given in the Old Testament, what God is declaring through Moses is that this is just a mere prototype of something bigger which God is constructing but Moses is able to reflect this in the world as a shadow. So what God is saying about the structure of the Mosaic covenant is that it was a mere copy. But rather that God intended to do something even greater.
In verse 6 he says this, “But now, he has obtained a more excellent ministry. As much as he is also the mediator,” look at this. “Of a better covenant,” which we refer to as the new covenant, “Which has been enacted on better promises. For if the first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no occasion sought for a second.” What God is saying in this passage is that the covenant, was in fact inadequate. It was weak. It was a shadow.
But now there is a better covenant with better promises. Essentially what he’s saying is to add anything from the old covenant into the new covenant is to completely misunderstand what Jesus has accomplished for you in this world. This is why I say to us believers, this should be the anthem of everything that we carry in life because when you look at the rest of the world, everything apart from biblical Christianity does not understand grace and forgiveness for which Jesus has accomplished for us.
The thing that makes Christianity unique from every religion in the world is what Jesus has done for you in grace and forgiveness. All religions in the world build a system in which to achieve righteousness before God but what we begin to find in this new covenant is that it is inadequate to satisfy the need for which the soul has for forgiveness and righteousness in the Lord. So to rebuild anything, is what Galatians calls an anathema. It’s a complete misunderstanding because everything in the Old Testament was a shadow of what Jesus would ultimately fulfill.
That’s why Jesus said you can’t put new wine in old wineskins. It’s why Jesus said in John 5:39 that everything is fulfilled in him and said the same thing in Luke chapter 24 and verse 27. That’s why Jesus said this cup is a new covenant in my blood. When you follow the idea of covenant in scripture, when you read in the book of Genesis in the end of chapter 11, into chapter 12, God calls a man named Abraham. In chapter 15, he creates this covenant with Abraham where he causes Abraham to fall asleep and it’s God who instills the covenant with Abraham. Abraham doesn’t reciprocate in a covenant with God.
God promises Abraham and they covenant that through Abraham all nations would be blessed and God alone establishes this covenant, leaving Abraham asleep on the side. So through Abraham all nations would be blessed. What happens when you get to the book of Exodus is God identifies where the messiah would come that would bless all people and so he sets a people group apart to be identified as the one through which the messiah would come. So he establishes the mosaic covenant.
But Galatians tells us that the Mosaic covenant which comes hundreds of years after Abraham is not going to eradicate what God has promised us. So the Mosaic covenant is given for us to identify the messiah who was to come. This passage tells us that this covenant, this mosaic covenant was not able to ultimately fulfill what the people needed or that it was a shadow that pointed to something greater. Now what does this mean?
Does this mean the Old Testament law was bad? That you should have nothing to do with it, forget about it, don’t ever read it, don’t ever look at it? Well let me just tell you like this. I’m going to flip through scripture just a little bit, because I want you to see. You can follow along if you want. You can just listen, but I want you to see how the New Testament begins to describe exactly how our perspective should be about this covenant, the old covenant given.
If you were to look in Romans chapter 7, Paul really starts to lay out for us exactly how we are to view this covenant. It says this, in chapter 7, verse 7, “What shall we say then? Is the law sin?” Is the old covenant, is that sin? He says, “May it never be. On the contrary, I would not have come to know sin except through the law. I would not have known about coveting, if the law had not said you shall not covet, but sin taking opportunity through the commandment produce in me every kind for apart from the law, sin is dead.” That’s into verse 8.
If you were to flip over to chapter 8 and verse 1, “Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ has set you free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, weak as it was, through the flesh, God did, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, as an offering for sin.” So in chapter 7, it’s saying to us, in verse 7, the law isn’t bad. In fact the law demonstrates the holiness of God, but where the law was weak in chapter 8, in saying to us, it can’t achieve our righteousness, Christ did.
Which is why if you flip on over to chapter 10, it says this. He says, Paul says about the Jews, “Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for them is for their salvation. For I testify about them, that they have a zeal for God but not according with knowledge, for not knowing about God’s righteousness and seeking to establish their own. They did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God.” For listen to this. “For Christ is the end of the law, for righteousness for everyone who believes.”
It’s the impossibility of religious performance. But Jesus, Jesus establishes our righteousness. That’s why when he makes a sacrifice, he sits down at the right hand of the Father. That’s why Hebrews chapter 1 and verse 1 tells us, “In times past, God spoke to the prophets, but today he speaks to us through his Son.” If you were to carry this same idea and look in the book of Galatians, I don’t have time to read all of this, but I would tell you if you want to read the book of Galatians and look what it says. Every time it mentions the word law, it is significant to read.
It says this in Galatians chapter 3, verse 23, “But before faith came, we were kept in custody under the law, being shut up to the faith which was later to be revealed. Therefore, the law has become our tutor, to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith. But now that faith,” verse 25. “Now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. For we are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.”
So did the law have a purpose? Yes, absolutely. What did it show us? The holiness of God. But does the law bring us holiness? No. Because the law is weak. What the law does is condemn us. It becomes a tutor in our condemnation, to show us our need for a savior. So how then do we view the law? Well if you get to the end of Galatians, it then says this.
It says, in verse 22, “But the fruit of the Spirit …” This is what God desires to do in you, is to renew you, give you life, put his Spirit within you. Look. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against,” listen to this. “Against such things, there is no law.”
So if you were to ask me today, Nathaniel, do you follow law? Do you follow the Old Testament law, I would tell you, no. I don’t. Jesus fulfilled it. What do you follow? Well now I live by the Spirit. As Galatians 6:1 says, it says, “I follow the law of Christ,” or 6:1-4. What is the law of Christ? It’s the Spirit of God now working within me to produce the fruit of the Spirit. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness.
Now when I live my life according to the Spirit, Jesus summed it up really in two ways, loving God and loving others. If I love God, I’m going to love what God loves and what God loves is people. I’m going to demonstrate the way I worship God by the way I treat people. But when I live the fruit of the Spirit, sometimes it looks like Old Testament because it demonstrated the holiness of God, but I don’t wake up every day and say to myself, how can I live 613 commandments?
I wake up every day and say this. Jesus thank you for giving your life for me, and now God I’m surrendering my life for you as my king. God fill me. Use me. In this passage, it’s showing us that the Old Testament law, it doesn’t save. You don’t put new wine in an old wineskin. You don’t put Jesus on top of law. Jesus has set you free. Jesus has paid it all. So you see this in the idea of the discussion of Jesus being a priest and the temple being a shadow and he’s quoting Genesis chapter 25 and verse 40.
Then, one of the most powerful things I think he could do by way of example for us, is he starts this in Hebrews chapter 8, verse 8. He quotes a section of scripture all the way from the Old Testament. Jeremiah 31, verse 31 to 34. In fact, I’ve said this to you often, that the New Testament is written by Jews. They understand how this all fits together. They walked with Jesus. So when they’re quoting from the Old Testament, they’re not just doing it to do it, to show you how smart they are. They’re drawing all the way back to the Old Testament so that you can see the understanding of this picture as it’s fulfilled for us today.
Here in Hebrews chapter 8, the author is quoting Jeremiah 31:31 and get this. This is the longest section of Old Testament scripture quoted in the New Testament. So this says to me, if any point in the New Testament, this should be, we should consider it a powerful quote from scripture. It has got to be the longest section of Old Testament quoted.
So he quotes Jeremiah 31:31. Look what he says. “For finding fault with them,” he says behold, talking about the Jews who never fulfilled the old covenant, the mosaic covenant. He says, “Behold, days are coming says the Lord, when I will effect a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah.” He’s quoting Jeremiah, the prophet who’s about to see his people go into captivity because of their disobedience. Then Jeremiah, he’s saying we’re still looking for that new covenant.
In the Old Testament there’s already the declaration that God is going to bring about a new covenant. We have shared how God has communicated this throughout all of Hebrews. In fact, if we just went with last week, we quoted from Psalm 110. Talking about the Melchizedek priesthood being fulfilled in a priest and a king who was eternal. God is the only one who can do that. Now it’s referencing this in terms of a new covenant. In the Old Testament, he’s telling the Jews, look something new is going to happen. There has to be a paradigm shift. There has to be a change in the way you see things because this old covenant, though it is holy, it’s weak.
It’s this new covenant with the House of Israel and the House of Judah. Not like the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt. For they did not continue in that covenant, and I did not care for them, says the Lord. Then he goes on and he tells us exactly what this new covenant’s going to be like. He says this, “For this is the covenant that I will.” I want you to pay attention to every time it says the word will.
“I will make with the House of Israel after those days, says the Lord.” When it talks about a covenant in scripture I want us to know it’s different than contracts. When two people make contracts, they kind of come into it as equals. Both sides are obligated to fulfill terms of the contract. If not, it’s obsolete. It’s no longer living out what the contract obligates you to, right? But a covenant is different. Especially if it’s in terms of God or a ruler. Because when an authority made a covenant with people and in our case when God makes a covenant with us, we don’t bring anything to the table.
The way this word covenant is written in Greek, what it’s saying to us, is that God is bringing all this to us, and it’s for you. Take it or leave it. It’s kind of like, if I compared it today in terms of a will. When someone leaves their will behind. It’s take it or leave it. This is what’s being given to you, and that’s the will. In terms of covenant, this is what God wills for us. I will make the house of Israel in those days, says the Lord. “I will put my law in their minds. I will write them on their hearts, and I will be their God and they shall be my people.”
Verse 10 gives us two ideas of what this new covenant is about. First is this supernatural change from the inside out. Jesus’ criticism to the Pharisees in the gospels, “Woe are you Pharisees, because on the outside you’re beautiful, but you’re like whitewashed tombs because on the inside you’re dead.” Religion is all about behavior modification. It’s all about performance on the outside. But Jesus is about transforming the heart from the inside out.
So he’s saying to us this supernatural change, that’s why I say God has given everything for you. Now this point, this paradigm shift for us, this change in which God has called us to, isn’t you changing, but it’s you laying yourself down before the Lord because of what he’s done for you, and him changing you from the inside out. There’s this supernatural change, verse 10, and the second half of this verse is saying that he shall be our God and we shall be his people. It’s this personal intimacy and relationship with God.
In a religious sense, you’d never know where you stand with God. You always hope it’s good enough, but you’re never sure. But in Jesus, in Jesus because of what he’s done for you, because he sits at the right hand of the Father, when the Lord sees you covered in the blood of Christ, you’re good enough. Not because of you, but because of him. It brings this intimacy with you and the Lord.
Then it goes on in verse 11, “And they shall not teach everyone his fellow citizen and everyone his brother, saying know the Lord, for all will know me from the least of them to the greatest.” Here’s what it’s saying guys. In Moses’ day, there were the spiritual elites. Not everyone was educated, but the spiritual elites were. There were special positions. There were the priests. They learned the old covenant. But through Jesus now, the ground is level at the foot of the cross.
There is no spiritual elitism. Peter tells us that we all become priests in Christ. We all have access to his throne. All of us walk through this door coming from different places in life. But when it comes to Jesus, all of us have equal footing before our Lord because of what he has done. In verse 12, “For I will be merciful to their iniquities and I will remember their sins no more.”
Look, I know when we talk in terms of the Lord, saying God doesn’t remember anything doesn’t speak to the character of his all-knowing ability. I want to explain what this passage is saying. When it’s saying God remembers no more, it has to do with this judicial condemnation of God as a righteous judge. God is all-knowing, so it’s impossible for him to forget. God always knows but what it’s saying to us is when you come before a righteous judge who is God, and he looks at your record, you just picture if you walk into a courtroom and you know you’re guilty. The judge is about to deliver his verdict. When he slams down the gavel to deliver his verdict, knowing that you’re guilty, rather than call you guilty, he declares you innocent. He doesn’t just declare you innocent. He declares you royalty of the king.
Jesus not only forgave your past, not holding you guilty, but he also establishes you in the righteousness of who he is as king. It’s like saying this. He doesn’t take your bank account which is negative, and he just gives it a zero to make it even, but he fills that sucker up like you just won the lottery. All the riches, heavenly, are yours in Christ.
What it’s saying to you in verse 12, in his mercy, in the midst of your iniquities, he doesn’t count those sins against you anymore, but rather the righteousness of Christ belongs to you. So this is how he describes it at the end. When he said a new covenant, he has made the first obsolete, but whatever is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to disappear. This word obsolete literally means obliterated.
When it comes to the old covenant, Jesus has obliterated it. Because for you, coming before God, it can never establish what you need. It is weak. But who’s done that? Jesus. This is why I say to us this morning, the understanding of this passage of scripture is paramount for us as followers of Jesus because this is everything that we live out in our lives. It is important for you to know Romans 7:7 and Romans chapter 8 and Romans chapter 10. Those passages that I read, it’s important to know Galatians chapter 3, verse 24 and 25. That the law was a tutor to simply point us to our need for Jesus.
Because in this world, people are walking through this world with the weight of it on their shoulders, hoping that they are just good enough but Jesus has set them free. You have the opportunity in the declaration of what that means of saying look, I myself was condemned and I came before the judge, and rather than having him pound the gavel and declare me guilty, Jesus has embraced me in his love. He’s paid it all and he is sitting at the right hand of the Father, showing the sufficiency for which he has done, for me, for you.
Sometimes I know within the context of Christianity, we get labeled as hypocrites, right? I hear people say that sometimes about Christians, we are hypocrites. Can I just tell you that rather than fight against that, just go with it man. Yes we are. Yes we are. I mean every time I gather on Sunday, it’s that declaration, right? I am called to follow Jesus and I’m going to middle school camp this week with 65 middle schoolers man. At some point, I don’t know what’s going to happen. We’re going to have a good time and everything, but I’m going to lose some sleep. I got my kids there, and you think about that. I want to walk in righteousness all week long, but it’s a week of just me.
When I walk outside of faith, I mess up. I’m a hypocrite. I am, but when I come here on Sunday, it is that declaration. In the midst of that, Jesus is good. Jesus is good and my soul needs that king. I am not living in my righteousness. I cannot get it in my righteousness. I will never achieve it in my righteousness. I am just going to surrender to this king that he can transform me from the inside out.
I like what Charles Spurgeon said. He said this. “If any man thinks ill of you, do not be angry with him, for you’re worse off than he thinks you are.” But you think about that. I mean, what if the world could see the thoughts you think and the attitude that you carry when no one else is around. When you think no one else is looking, when you’re by yourself, what if those thoughts were on display? What would people think of you? I am not perfect. But thank God for the sufficiency of Christ. Thank God that this morning my soul can surrender to him.
It doesn’t matter where your background comes from when you walk through the door because the ground is just level at the foot of the cross for Jesus to heal me, Jesus to transform me, Jesus to make me new. I like to always close in this series with something from the course of Christian history. When I think about the beauty of the new covenant, the freedom that Christ brings, for me there is one figure that just walked through that in such profound way and that was Corrie Ten Boom.
Corrie Ten Boom was just an average person, living under the regime of Nazi Germany. She worked for her father in a watch shop. All of a sudden she found herself a part of a group of people that were trying to preserve the life of the Jews. They would hide them. They would come to her for protection and Corrie Ten Boom would hid them. Eventually she got caught, along with her sister. They go to a concentration camp in some of the most horrendous conditions. Her sister ends up dying in that concentration camp.
The profound thing that Corrie Ten Boom did … I know she did some great things while the war was going on in preserving the Jews, but the thing that just floors me was what she did after the war. Corrie Ten Boom after the war went to the Nazis, who were torn up over the things that they had done in that war. She helped provide for them a place of healing. She brought them into the forgiveness of what Christ preaches. She ministered to souls that people would think were too dark to reach. After her sister died, in those camps, she saw what the beauty of the new covenant could do in the hearts of the people and she said there is no pit so deep that God’s love is not deeper still.
I look at that circumstance and I think to myself, how could love someone like that. But then you think about us in light of Jesus. Perfect king. Coming for sinful man to give his life as a servant, while we mocked him and hung him on a cross. Romans 5:8. God demonstrates his love toward us in while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. That love renews my soul. Corrie Ten Boom lives this out with the very people who were her enemy. This is messy. This is gross. This is painful. In the midst of all this darkness, this is beautiful, but the soul can be redeemed. There is no depth that God’s love cannot transform. Guys that is the story of our savior, and that is the story that we share every time our lives grab ahold of the new covenant for what Jesus has done for you to set you free in him.