Study Desk

but there was an oath regarding Jesus. For God said to him, "The Lord has taken an oath and will not break his vow: ‘You are a priest forever.'"

Because of this oath, Jesus is the one who guarantees this better covenant with God.

Therefore he is able, once and forever, to save those who come to God through him. He lives forever to intercede with God on their behalf.

The law appointed high priests who were limited by human weakness. But after the law was given, God appointed his Son with an oath, and his Son has been made the perfect High Priest forever.

Here is the main point: We have a High Priest who sat down in the place of honor beside the throne of the majestic God in heaven.

They serve in a system of worship that is only a copy, a shadow of the real one in heaven. For when Moses was getting ready to build the Tabernacle, God gave him this warning: "Be sure that you make everything according to the pattern I have shown you here on the mountain."

But now Jesus, our High Priest, has been given a ministry that is far superior to the old priesthood, for he is the one who mediates for us a far better covenant with God, based on better promises.

But when God found fault with the people, he said: "The day is coming, says the Lord , when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah.

But this is the new covenant I will make with the people of Israel on that day, says the Lord : I will put my laws in their minds, and I will write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.

When God speaks of a "new" covenant, it means he has made the first one obsolete. It is now out of date and will soon disappear.

That first covenant between God and Israel had regulations for worship and a place of worship here on earth.

Just think how much more the blood of Christ will purify our consciences from sinful deeds so that we can worship the living God. For by the power of the eternal Spirit, Christ offered himself to God as a perfect sacrifice for our sins.

That is why he is the one who mediates a new covenant between God and people, so that all who are called can receive the eternal inheritance God has promised them. For Christ died to set them free from the penalty of the sins they had committed under that first covenant.

Then he said, "This blood confirms the covenant God has made with you."

For Christ did not enter into a holy place made with human hands, which was only a copy of the true one in heaven. He entered into heaven itself to appear now before God on our behalf.

That is why, when Christ came into the world, he said to God, "You did not want animal sacrifices or sin offerings. But you have given me a body to offer.

Then I said, ‘Look, I have come to do your will, O God— as is written about me in the Scriptures.'"

But our High Priest offered himself to God as a single sacrifice for sins, good for all time. Then he sat down in the place of honor at God's right hand.

let us go right into the presence of God with sincere hearts fully trusting him. For our guilty consciences have been sprinkled with Christ's blood to make us clean, and our bodies have been washed with pure water.

Let us hold tightly without wavering to the hope we affirm, for God can be trusted to keep his promise.