Hebrews
Chapter 9
1 Truly, the first agreement also had rules for worshiping God, and a sanctuary on earth.
2 They set up a tent; the first part had a lampstand, a table, and bread on display; this area is called the holy place.
3 Beyond the second curtain was the part of the tent called the Most Holy Place.
4 It had the golden incense burner and the gold-covered covenant chest, which held the gold jar of manna, Aaron’s staff that sprouted leaves, and the stone tablets of the covenant.
5 Above it were glorious angels covering the mercy seat; we cannot discuss this in detail now.
6 After these rules were set, the priests regularly entered the first part of the tent to perform God’s work.
7 The high priest alone went into the second room once a year, and always with blood, which he offered for himself and the people’s mistakes.
8 The Holy Spirit shows that the way into the most holy place was not clear while the first tent was still in use.
9 This represented the present time, where gifts and sacrifices were given that could not make the worshiper completely clear in conscience.
10 This referred only to food, drinks, various cleansings, and physical rules given to them until a time of change.
11 But Christ has come as a high priest of the good things that will happen, through a greater and more perfect place of worship, not built by hand, that is, not of this creation.
12 Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with his own blood, he went into the holy place once and got forever salvation for us.
13 If the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a young cow sprinkled on the unclean make the body clean.
14 How much more will Christ’s blood, who offered himself to God without any fault through the eternal Spirit, clean your conscience from useless actions so you can serve the living God?
15 For this reason, he is the mediator of the new agreement, so that through death, to free those who sinned under the first agreement, those who are invited can receive the promised eternal inheritance.
16 For there to be a will, the person who made it must die.
17 A will only takes effect when someone dies; it has no power while the person who made it is alive.
18 The first agreement was not made without using blood.
19 After Moses told all the rules to the people, he took the blood of calves and goats with water, red wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled it on the book and all the people.
20 This is the blood of the agreement which God has commanded for you.
21 He also sprinkled blood on both the tent and all the items used for service.
22 Almost everything is cleansed with blood by the law; and without blood being shed, there is no forgiveness.
23 So it was essential to clean the copies of heavenly things with these methods, but the heavenly things needed better offerings than these.
24 Christ did not enter a sanctuary made by humans, which is only a copy of the real one, but into heaven itself to be with God on our behalf.
25 He doesn’t need to offer himself many times, like the high priest who goes into the sacred place every year with blood that is not his own.
26 Since the world began, he would have had to suffer many times. But now, he has come once at the end of the ages to remove sin by sacrificing himself.
27 Everyone is meant to die once and after that comes judgment.
28 Christ was offered once to take away the sins of many; and he will appear a second time, not to deal with sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.