He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high…
—Hebrews 1:3
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Why has this wonderful and glorious being, in whom all things are summed up, and who is before all things the Father’s delight and the Father’s glory; why has this infinite light, this infinite power, this infinite majesty, come down to our poor earth? For what purpose? To shine? To show forth the splendour of His majesty? To teach heavenly wisdom? To rule by His just and holy might? No! He came to purge our sins. What height of glory! what depth of abasement! Infinite is His majesty, and infinite is His self-humiliation, and the depth of His love. What a glorious Lord! And what an awful sacrifice of unspeakable love, to purge our sins by Himself!
Sin has brought Him down from heaven. Our defilement has drawn Him from the height of His glory. Oh, what an expression, what a climax! “Who being the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His being, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins.”
Sin may be viewed as a transgression of God’s good, just, and holy law, deserving punishment, and bringing down the curse of God. Sin may be viewed as a disease unto death which requires healing. Sin is also defilement, and this view seems both the deepest and the most painful. Here perhaps we see most clearly and feel most painfully the difficulty, the utter impossibility, as far as man or angel is concerned, of being delivered from sin, and brought nigh unto the source of life, love, and blessedness.
Sin is a great and heavy burden. It is a departure from the Father’s house into a far country. It is ingratitude and rebelliousness, yea, even hatred of God. Power can lift and remove a burden. Compassion can seek the wayward and lost sheep, and follow it across hill, and moor, and wilderness until it finds it. Grace can stoop to declare unto an enemy the message of peace and good will. But sin is defilement. It is that which is loathsome to God, which fills His inmost being with repulsion. Think of our sins as defilement. Think of their number, of their heinousness! Who will remove this fearful and utterly loathsome iniquity which separates us hopelessly and infinitely from God in His holy and righteous love? Who will touch the leprosy? Who can take it out of the way, and cleanse the sinners, so that they appear pure and spotless in God’s sight?
The Son of God came to make the purification of our sins; and this, oh marvel of marvels! by Himself. Not like the high priest in Israel, offering something as a sacrifice; not with the blood, the life of another, but by Himself. He came into contact with this sin. He was the only one who could properly understand the true nature, depth, and guilt of sin. God of God, Son of the Father, He perfectly sympathized with the Father in His loathing and abhorrence of sin; but having befriended us, and having become one with us, He could not bear the thought of our being lost. So this loathsomeness of our iniquity, as loathsome to Jesus as to the Father, He takes upon Himself, as Joshua the high priest is seen by the prophet Zechariah. Jesus, perfect in His love to the holy and righteous Father, perfect in His love to the sinful and guilty people whom He came to save, with infinite hatred of sin and with infinite love of the sinner, enters, alone and unassisted, into that awful wilderness where, as our substitute and sin-bearer, He feels the Father’s face turned away from Him. As the expression of His agony, in which faith and love endured all things and triumphed, He utters the cry, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Then Jesus the Son of God purged by Himself our sins…
Sin is taken away. Oh, what a wonderful thing is this! When once you see that Jesus the Son of God died upon the cross, and purged your sins, and that because of His obedience unto death God hath exalted Him at His right hand, that, having effected by Himself this purification, He entered into heavenly glory, you have no more conscience of sin. You do not require day by day, as it were, to receive the forgiveness of your sins. You have been washed, you have been made clean, you have received full absolution and remission. Nay, more. In the heavenly sanctuary where Jesus is, sin no more can rise; and as you were crucified and buried with Him, so you are raised with Him, and seated together with Him in heavenly places. You need only to confess day by day, and with great humility, and contrition and sorrow, your continual transgressions and trespasses, that your feet may be washed. “He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit: and ye are clean.” But conscience of sin you have no longer. And although, as Christ becomes clearer and dearer, we see and feel more our sinfulness and unworthiness, although with increasing sorrow and mourning we confess our unbelief and ingratitude, we have no longer conscience of sin, the conscience is free from the burden, and purified from the defilement of sin. As forgiven and accepted, as pure and spotless, as worshippers within the holiest of all, we appear before God: in the light of His love we behold, and acknowledge our sin.
Christ, the Son of God, the Lamb that was slain, is our High Priest, our Righteousness. What other—man invented and appointed—priest will intrude here? What other sacrifice can be mentioned? What works, offerings, or tears of our own can be thought of? Jesus, the Son of God, the Son of man, by Himself hath cleansed us from our sins.
The apostle has thus spoken of the greatness of Christ. Why does Jesus reveal His majesty and His glory? Not that we should tremble, and not merely that we should reverence and adore, but that our hearts should be drawn out to Him in love. The words of Jesus Himself in Matthew 11 are quite a parallel to our passage. Jesus first shows that no man knoweth the Father but the Son, and no man knoweth the Son but the Father, and that all things are given into His hands. Why does He say this? Why does He, as it were, exalt Himself, and reveal His dignity, and His divine authority over all creation? It is only that He may embrace us in His arms; it is only that He may add immediately, “Come unto me, all ye that are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
Oh, the more majestic and glorious Jesus appears to us, the sweeter will be our peace, and the more childlike our confidence! This great, this infinite, this glorious Jesus was attracted by your very sin, and by your very guilt, and by your very helplessness. It was to purge our iniquities that He came down from heaven. Let us know, that we have obtained mercy, and that we have received the forgiveness of our sins, even through the redemption by the blood of Christ. Let us know it, that henceforth we may no longer be the servants of sin, that henceforth we may no longer walk in darkness; but, being delivered from all fear, and brought nigh unto God in Jesus, we may walk in love even as the Saviour God has loved us, and that we who have obtained mercy may show in our daily walk that we are merciful, forgiving one another, and forbearing one another, and introducing into every branch of our life and every sphere of our activity the new principle of love, even the holy, forgiving, and renewing love of God. Amen.
—Adolf Saphir, The Epistle to the Hebrews: An Exposition, Volume 1, p. 62-69
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O, beloved—we hate our sin. I know we do. We desperately want to do what is right: to be obedient, to subdue our tendencies toward fleshly desires so that we might live by the Spirit in order to please Him. We get so very frustrated with ourselves when we stumble over and over and over again, I know. Our sin causes us great shame. We long to flee from it, be free from it; to escape its cold, hard grasp, the heavy burden that comes from carrying it here.
He came for this very purpose, beloved, do you know? (tender) To rid us of our sin. This is good news. Our sickness, our desperation, the worst bits of us—He came to heal and soothe and transform! Our sin, that which is loathsome to God, is no more! He knows it not, for He Himself has already borne it and disposed of it! And more!—it is what attracted Him to us, my sweet one. It makes Him want to hold us tenderly to His breast. It endears us to Him. It brings out His gentleness—seeing our immense struggle, our immense need.
But beloved? (gentle) We no longer need to sit in our feelings of shame and utter defeat, despising ourselves, for as He says in Romans 8:1, ‘There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.’ Do we grieve our sin mightily? Yes. Do we confess and repent, daily, moment by moment, begging Him for contrite, humble hearts? Yes. Do we do everything in our power to flee from sin and its power over us? Yes, beloved. But we simultaneously rest in His victory over sin; we simultaneously give Him praise for His making purification for our sins! We don’t find our identify in our sin and pain, my love. (gentle) We rejoice in that which causes us to need Him more than all else, do you see? (tender, hopeful)
We need not despair or loathe ourselves; we need not grumble about our many weaknesses, my precious one, or even wish them away. We can know peace now—right now. We will surely fail Him again, beloved, and yet, our ever-growing Love for Him affords us Hope; Hope that, as we see and know more and more of our Savior, our desire for sin, for anything but Him, will fade slowly away. He will become more and we will become less, my love. (tender) This is my prayer; this is our song. (strong)
‘The more majestic and glorious Jesus appears to us, the sweeter will be our peace, and the more childlike our confidence!’ O, beloved—might He be to us ever more precious, ever more desirable, ever more worthy until we, like little children, can put our full faith and trust in Christ and in Christ alone, for All Things! May it be so. May He hold us tightly all the days of our earthly lives, and may He graciously bring us safely Home, Together—His two little lambs, resting securely in His strong but gentle arms: forever and ever, One.
O, Lord, please, may it be so? (reverent, in awe, humbled, pleading with Him as never before)
Amen.