And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment, so Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many. To those who eagerly wait for Him He will appear a second time, apart from sin, for salvation.  

Hebrews 9:27-28 

What is that one appointment we will all keep? It is our appointment with death. We prefer not to think about it too much. We realize it is on the way. Every day brings us a step closer to it. We expect to live out our seventy or eighty years and hope to die peacefully in our sleep. Facts tell us that only a certain percentage of the population will die that way. Every siren reminds us that life can come to an end quickly and unexpectedly. How can we prepare ourselves for this inevitable appointment and the judgment that follows it as our text reminds us? The answer is Christ. Christ has offered the once-for-all sacrifice for sins. For us to be in Christ is to know that He has done all that is required for God to accept us. It is not even our faith that saves us rather it is Christ Who saves. We receive Him by faith, but even that faith is a gift of God. This allows us to face this final appointment without fear. Our appeal to you is that you embrace this Christ Who Alone can prepare you to meet this last appointment.  

Our Wise and Sovereign God, 
we rejoice that You hold our life in Your Hands. 
We praise You that You have provided for us, 
eternal life in Christ.  

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning

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.  

Hebrews 8:13 

Christ was plain about His purpose to supersede the old order of things with that which was new. He made direct reference to this when He said, ‘No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment; or else the new piece pulls away from the old, and the tear is made worse. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; or else the new wine bursts the wineskins, the wine is spilled, and the wineskins are ruined. But new wine must be put into new wineskins.’ The writer of Hebrews goes to great lengths to show his audience how thoroughly Christ does supersede the old covenant. The elements of the old covenant were a means to an end. Once they fulfilled their purpose in the larger scheme they were no longer relevant. Hence, the sacrifices, ceremonial laws, and practices ceased over the course of time. This is altogether as it should be, although it was frankly not an easy sell. The Jews had clung tenaciously to the ancient traditions. It would take a remarkable movement of the Holy Spirit to convince them that God was making the old covenant obsolete. This is the inherent controversy that exists even today between Judaism and Christianity. It centers upon Who and What Christ is. According to the writer of Hebrews, He is the Mediator of the new covenant. This means the old covenant has grown old and is vanishing away. Christ makes all things new.  

Our Gracious God and our Savior, 
we rejoice that You do all things in due course of time. 
We praise You that You are  
removing the old and replacing it with the new.  

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning

For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more. 

Hebrews 8:12 

Will there ever come a time when God somehow calls our sins again before us? According to our text the answer is, ‘no.’ Is this the only place we find such a statement? In the mercy of God there are other blessed statements with which God assures us. David declares, ‘As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.’ If God has removed our sins from us as far as the east is from the west, how could He remember them against us anymore? Hezekiah, in the midst of his illness said, ‘For You have cast all my sins behind your back.’ He understood that once God is done with our sin, He is done with them forever. This brings us to dwell upon the permanent nature of the sacrifice of Christ. As the writer of Hebrews moves into the ninth chapter, he speaks of the sacrifice of Christ as the sacrifice far superior to any other ever offered by a High Priest of the house of Aaron. He says that if Christ had been an Aaronic priest, ‘He then would have had to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now, once at the end of the ages, He has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.’ Thus, Christ is the ultimate High Priest Who has offered Himself as the perfect sacrifice, once for all. This is why God will remember our sins against us, no more.  

Our Glorious, Sovereign God, 
we rejoice that You deal with our sin. 
We praise You that because of Christ, 
You put them away forever.  

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning

For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more. 

Hebrews 8:12 

We think of God as the One Who sees all, knows all, is all-powerful, and Who forgets nothing. All of these are true when we consider Him as the Sovereign, unchanging God. Having said that, we take Him at His word when He says there are things He consciously, willingly, refuses to remember. This touches on us personally. It is a matter of fact that we are full of unrighteousness, sins, and lawless deeds. The best people, by human standards, ‘fall short of the glory of God.’ As the psalmist put it. ‘If You, LORD, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand?’ The psalmist goes on to answer the question he has raised by saying, ‘but there is forgiveness with You, that You may be feared.’ This brings us to the discussion of what God refuses to remember and why He does. The answer to this lies in Christ, the Mediator of the new and better covenant. As the Prophet, He has preached Himself to us. As the Perfect High Priest, He has offered Himself as the perfect atoning, substitutionary sacrifice for all our sins. Because God has imputed all our sins to Christ, and all Christ’s righteousness to us, God remembers our unrighteousness, sins, and lawless deeds against us no more.  

Our Great and Gracious God, 
we rejoice that You input to us the righteousness of Christ. 
We praise You that You have put away 
all our sins because of Him. 

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning