(A) Introduction

This passage causes a variety of reactions even amongst Christians. There are those who revel in the shed blood of Jesus. They sing the old Sankey hymns with gusto:

(B) The New Covenant only becomes effective through the death of Jesus

This is made clear in v15: For this reason Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance - now that he has died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant. In verses16 and 17 the importance of Christ's death is reinforced. The writer does this by using the Greek word for 'covenant' not in the normal New Testament sense but according to its ordinary usage to mean, 'a will'. The New Covenant is like a will in one very important way - it only becomes effective on the death of the testator or benefactor. We have to ask why the death of Jesus was necessary for a believer to be given eternal life? The Prodigal Son received forgiveness and was reinstated into the family without a sacrifice being offered. In the parable told by Jesus and recorded in Matthew18v21to35 the servant who owed his king millions of pounds without the means to pay was forgiven. v26 The servant fell on his knees before him. 'Be patient with me,' he begged, 'and I will pay back everything.' The servant's master took pity on him, cancelled the debt and let him go. The King cancelled the debt without a sacrifice being involved - except his own of forfeiting the money. Psalm 51 vs 16 and 17 suggest that God takes little or no pleasure in sacrifices:
You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.
Yet the writer to the Hebrews in vs 18 to 22 emphasises the importance of Jesus death to the validity and effectiveness of the New Covenant going as far as to affirm: Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.v22. In doing so he his simply reinforcing the words of Jesus quoted above. ("This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins")

It remains in some respects strange that the death of Jesus and the blood shed assumes such significance to the writer. The blood of Jesus was shed by men but not with the intent of making sacrifice. It was shed as a consequence of a gross injustice. God did not punish the Son by spilling his blood. The only penal action God took was to withdraw from fellowship with his Son for a limited period. Jesus' physical death was hardly a punishment for sin. The work of salvation was complete before Jesus died. Jesus life was not taken from him - he dismissed his spirit when he realised that his work was finished. These are facts to be born in mind as we try and explain the importance of the shed blood of Jesus.

(C) The importance of the shed blood of Jesus.

(a) It captures attention
Nothing arrests our attention more than blood. It cannot be ignored. I can remember our old cricket captain, Cyril, eating a sandwich and biting his lip. He carried on chewing his sandwich. The blood dribbled down his chin, it stained the bread of his sandwich crimson. It wasn't something you could ignore. Most of the team lost their appetite and two had to leave in a hurry and could be heard retching outside.

When Moses gave God's law to the Israelites - the scrolls and all the people were sprinkled with blood. This would have made a profound impression and focused attention on the solemnity of the occasion. So the blood shed at Calvary draws attention to what Jesus was doing on the cross. God could have abandoned him in the desert or on a solitary mountain peak but who then would have known anything about God's reaction to his Son becoming sin for us. Jesus himself said, " But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself." John12v32. The shed blood arrests us. It has strong emotional appeal.

(b) It emphasises a most serious matter.
The shed blood is not a gimmick. It is easy to attract attention using a gimmick. However it is possible for the gimmick to devalue the message. I never like it when a preacher starts his message with a joke that has nothing to do with the content of the message. I don't object to jokes, certainly not to jokes that illustrate a truth that the preacher is trying to express, but a joke for the sake of a joke demeans the message. It's as if the preacher is saying, "My message is insufficient in and of itself - it needs this joke to make it more palatable."

The fact of Jesus' shed blood signals that something is seriously wrong. Even the blood of bulls and goats highlighted the seriousness of being unclean, defiled and cut off from the worship of God's people. When men made Jesus bleed he was paying the price of being good. God permitted it. See the words of Peter in Acts2v23 "This man was handed over to you by God's set purpose and foreknowledge and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross." God permitted it to show where sin leads. The cross, the shed blood, emphasises the nature of sin - it so destroys man's relationship with God that when his own people were confronted by his Son, his anointed one, the Saviour promised long, the shout goes up, "We will not have this man to reign over us. Crucify him. Let his blood be on us and our children." There have been many awful things done this century. I have just finished reading about the consequences of Stalin's purges that resulted in millions dying in ghastly, depraved, satanic, labour camps in the Siberian Arctic but the human wickedness revealed there is as nothing compared to the rampant sin that hammered home the nails and condemned the Lord of Glory to the cruel tree.

The blood shed is a warning sign, it is a warning sign in deepest crimson. We are in danger if we ignore it.

(c) It confirms a price has been paid and accepted.
The shed blood speaks to us of sacrifice. A sacrifice was made not so much because God's justice demanded it but because sinful men required it.

(1) It is possible to take forgiveness for granted without tangible evidence of the cost involved. Easy forgiveness is not appreciated. This is true of the million pound debtor. I expect he said to himself, "Well that was easy. A few tears and I got off. He's so rich he can afford to lose a few millions. He won't even miss them." The bankrupt was so little chastened and humbled by the king's magnanimity that when he found a poor fellow who owed him a few miserable pounds he took him by the throat and dragged him off to prison. I think the Prodigal was helped to value his forgiveness by the ensuing trouble with the elder brother. The father's generosity led to a breakdown in relations with his older son. A price was paid.

We can never take forgiveness for granted. Jesus precious blood was shed. He suffered on the cross, the just for the unjust, to bring us to God.

(2) It is easy to doubt the possibility of forgiveness without a price being paid.
There is an instructive passage in Genesis50 v15 to 21. After Jacob died Joseph's brothers worried that, maybe, Joseph still held a grudge against them for selling him as a slave into Egypt. It seemed that he had forgiven them but, perhaps, it was only for their father's sake. They lacked assurance of forgiveness. Joseph had to say to them, "Don't be afraid. I will provide for you and your children." And he reassured them and spoke kindly to them. v21

The sacrifice of Jesus reassures us of forgiveness. Jesus sealed, secured, our pardon with his blood. Let us look at the purpose of sacrifice:

• It is a public acknowledgement of failure. The Old Testament sacrifices were offered in the hope that they would be accepted as such and the failure forgiven. Jesus acted as our representative and his death was an admission on our behalf of our failure to please God.

• It involves transferring blame to an innocent representative. The sheep and goats of the Old Testament sacrifices were innocent of committing sin. They suffered in the place of those that had sinned. Jesus was in the words of John the Baptist, "The Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!"

• It is only a token payment of a great debt owed. This is the aspect of sacrifice that is most important and often forgotten. There is nothing fair about a sacrifice. God's sense of justice is not satisfied by it. Rather, we need to make a payment to show that we are sorry. We depend upon God in love accepting such payment as we can make. Jesus by going willingly to the cross and there 'bearing shame and scoffing rude' made a token payment for sin, all our sin, mankind's sin. He was a man, one of us, and he was doing what only a man could do - offering himself as a sacrifice - making that one last token payment for our iniquities. God graciously accepted it and set us free from the consequences of our sin.

So the writer to the Hebrews draws attention to the shed blood of Jesus not because God demanded something horrible of his Son to satisfy his need for justice but rather to satisfy our need for some payment to be made. All sacrifices are a token payment and depend for their effectiveness upon the willingness of the recipient to accept them. God accepted the sacrifice of his Son. It was the last payment for sin that he was prepared to accept. Nothing more along those lines is required.

Redeemed how I love to proclaim it, Redeemed by the blood of the Lamb; Redeemed through His infinite mercy, His child and forever I am. Redeemed, redeemed, Redeemed by the blood of the Lamb, Redeemed, redeemed, His child and for ever I am.