In the case of a will, it is necessary to prove the death of the one who made it, because a will is in force only when somebody has died; it never takes effect while the one who made it is living. This is why even the first covenant was not put into effect without blood.
Hebrews 9:16-18
Living here in Central Florida, I can’t begin to tell you how big NASCAR racing is. It’s everywhere. The races and drivers are talked about by people as they meet on the street. Every angle of each race is covered over and over again by the media. Heck, people even wear NASCAR shirts and hats to church.
But there’s a sure-fire way to really know and measure just how important NASCAR is. I’ve done a very scientific study, including exacting measurements, to prove what I’m saying. I’ve got all the observations and data to prove what I’m about to say.
Traffic volumes go way down whenever there’s a race. People say home to watch every lap. Every pitstop. Every crash. From the “Drivers, start your engines” all the way through to the checkered flag, the streets are virtually empty of cars. There are no shoppers in stores or supermarkets.
And while people are glued to their super large HD screens for the entire race, there’s one moment that everyone wants to watch. They all have to be there for the start. When the cars approach the starting line and the green flag is waved, everyone is watching. Cheering for their favorite driver.
There are lots and lots of other starts that people get all excited over. And some of them aren’t even related to sports. Grand openings of a new business gathers a crowd. People come from all around for the start of a marriage. Everyone loves the birth of a baby. Especially grandparents.
But there are other starts that people don’t get all that excited about. The start of a divorce. The beginning of a prison sentence. The start of chemo or radiation therapy to treat cancer.
I remember the start that changed everything. I got a call at 12:37 AM to tell me that my dad had died. This one call started a whole lot of things. And even though my dad was 101, and we’d talked and planned a lot about what he wanted when he died, it still was a start.
One of the things it started was his will. While dad was alive, his will was just a bunch of pages that were filed in a folder. His words were on those pages, but they just sat there without any power. But when he died, they came to life.
This is what the writer of this letter is saying to the Hebrews. When God gave them the first covenant, the Old Testament, it needed the death of sacrifices to have any power. To change their lives. To forgive sin.
We don’t like to think about sacrifices that need a death to take place. To us, it seems brutal. It seems unnecessary. Couldn’t we just say we’re sorry and be done with it? Couldn’t we write a check or swipe a credit card and call it even? After all, what did the poor animal do? We’ll get in trouble with Animal Control and the ASPCA.
But there’s a hidden truth that we need to come face-to-face with. An important reality that we’d rather not think about. We’d prefer that it just hide somewhere in a dark corner. Out of the way so it wouldn’t remind us of the uncomfortable truth that sin is destructive and painful.
There, I said it. Sin’s not like spending so much on your credit card that you start getting those reminders. Emails. Letters. Phone calls. Text messages. All with the one message that you’re behind. And to tell you just how serious it is, they’re going to add interest to what you have to pay up.
Credit cards and other debts are just too clean to be compared to sin. The messages and payments we get from credit card companies and banks are just letters and numbers on a page. It’s easy to just ignore them, or destroying them in a shredder.
They don’t sting like the hurt that sin does to God and people. Sin is painful in a way that I just don’t have the words to describe. Yes, there’s that immediate slicing pain when the sin is committed, but it doesn’t end there. Every time it comes back into our minds, the hurt and bitter disappointment comes back. Over and over, it returns like an incoming tide that nothing can stop.
This is why it took a God solution for sin. Someone a whole lot more powerful than our puny and weak efforts. It took the Son of God himself to take care of sin once and for all. He had to come to Earth as both God and man in Jesus. Live a perfect life and then die once and for all time for all sin.
No one else could ever do that. Heck, no one else ever thought of such a thing. Jesus, the unique Son of God, did the one thing that could take care of sin. Not our sacrifices, but God taking on our sin and paying for them. For us. He started something new that gives us new life. New power to serve him and live in newness of life[1].
Noodling Questions
List three things that you like to start. Explain.
Why is the start just the beginning?
How is it comforting that God’s going to finish what he starts? Describe.
[1] Romans 6:4
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