The Blood of the Covenant

DELIVERED ON LORD'S-DAY MORNING, NOVEMBER 14, 1880,

BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.

"This is the blood of the Testament which God has enjoined unto you."
Hebrews 9:20.

[The original title of this sermon was The Blood of the Testament..

THE Apostle declares that whenever God has entered into covenant with
man it has not been without the shedding of blood. To a covenant a
sacrifice and to a testament a death was evidently necessary. It was so
when the arrangements of Israelite worship were first published and
established in the wilderness. Paul says, "Neither the first testament
was dedicated without blood." He probably had in his mind's eye the
24th chapter of the book of Exodus where we read that after the tribes
had entered into covenant with God and promised to keep His Law, Moses,
"sent young men of the children of Israel, which offered burnt
offerings and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen unto the Lord. And
Moses took half of the blood and put it in basins and half of the blood
he sprinkled on the altar. And He took the Book of the Covenant and
read in the audience of the people: and they said, All that the Lord
has said will we do and be obedient. And Moses took the blood and
sprinkled it on the people and said, Behold the blood of the Covenant
which the Lord has made with you concerning all these words."

As it was in the old dispensation so is it in the new–there could be
no Divine Covenant, even though it was of Grace, without the shedding
of blood. Inasmuch as the new Covenant was not the type, but the
substance, a more precious sacrifice was needed and nobler blood than
any which is found in the veins of bulls or of goats. Jesus, the Son of
God must die, or the Covenant would be unsealed, the testament without
force. No Covenant blessing comes to us apart from the death of our
great Sacrifice, for "without shedding of blood is no remission," and
remission is one of the earliest of the gifts of Divine Grace. If we
cannot even begin the heavenly life by receiving forgiveness of sins
without coming into connection with the blood, we may be sure that no
further blessing can come to us apart from it.

It seems to be absolutely necessary that when God comes into
communication with guilty man it must be through an atonement and that
atonement must be made by blood, or by the sacrifice of a life. I shall
not dwell upon the blood-shedding of the old Covenant, for they are
only intended to be types of the one great blood-shedding in the death
of our Lord Jesus Christ. The death of a chosen victim was the emblem
of the death of Christ. The sprinkling of the people with blood was the
type of the application of the blood of Christ to the conscience of
Believers and every single item of the ceremony, if looked into, would
furnish points for edification. But of these we cannot, now, speak
particularly, as the Apostle said on a like occasion.

It suffices us to meditate, at this time, upon the blood of our Lord
Jesus, once and for all shed on Calvary, trying to understand its
relationship to us according to the tenor of the text–"This is the
blood of the Testament which God has enjoined unto you." The words
which Moses used in the wilderness concerning the typical sacrifice are
far more emphatic as we point you to the bleeding Savior on the Cross
and say, "Behold, the blood of the covenant which the Lord has made
with you." The wisdom of God had many ends to serve in connecting His
covenants with blood-shedding and this will be very evident if we think
of its effect upon our own hearts. We all feel somewhat of awe in
connection with the thought of blood. It is no light thing to see an
animal slaughtered–at least it is not so to me–I cannot endure the
sight! As to our fellow men, we can scarcely see the tiniest crimson
stream issuing from a wound in their flesh without being distressed.

Tender and sensitive natures, such as all should possess, regard the
life of men with great care and the blood, as its token, with great
reverence. We view a corpse with awe and if we were called to look upon
one who had been slain, we would view the body with horror. If any one
of us should pass a spot stained with a man's blood, we should tread
lightly and hurriedly, feeling, "how dreadful is this place." The Lord
God intended that there should be much of awe about every covenant

that He made with man, for it is a matter of great solemnity. The
Covenant of Works might well be surrounded with dread, for by reason of
our sin it was soon turned into a curse. The quaking mountain, the
thick darkness and the trumpet voice were fit accompaniments of the Law
which brings condemnation and so, also, were the basins filled with
blood.

As for the Covenant of Grace, it is also rightly surrounded with awe,
even with such awe as that which bows down at Calvary amid the mid-day
midnight, the rending of rocks, the opening graves and the groans of
the expiring Son of God. The God of Love is, nevertheless, a God of
Holiness and the God who passes by transgression, iniquity and sin, is
also a God who first vindicates the honor of His broken Law. The Lord
intended that pardon and all other Covenant blessings should come to us
in such a way that we should never think sin a trifle, nor conclude,
from the freeness of Grace that men were free to transgress. The death
of Jesus manifests the solemnity of God's dealings with sin and is
fitted to bow the soul in the lowest humility before God.

The flowing of the blood and water from the wounded side, the wrapping
of the dead body in the grave clothes, the burial in the
sepulcher–these are those sad attendants of the Covenant of Grace
which make us tender of heart while we rejoice in the Divine favor.
With holy trembling we think of every promise, for the shadow of the
Cross is over all. Something of aversion and shrinking crosses most
minds at the thought of blood. One feels sickened and saddened. The
sight of murdered Abel must have been terrible, indeed, to Adam and
Eve, unused as they were to gaze on blood. If it would be so to them
after the Fall, what would the sight have been to them had they
remained pure and perfect beings? In proportion to purity will be the
shock to the mind in the presence of death and blood.

Cruel men might gloat over a battlefield, but to the most of us, the
sight of a single violent death would be horrible to the last degree.
Manhood, till it is brutalized, has the greatest possible aversion to
the sight of blood and it is as though God had selected as the token of
Atonement that which would show us His hatred of sin. He would move us
to flee from evil after a sight of its painful and deadly consequences!
He as good as tells us that while a thing is stained with evil, He
would sooner destroy it than have it in His sight! Man, the masterpiece
of the Divine creation, shall sooner be slain and his life flow out
upon the ground than be allowed to wallow in iniquity! It was intended
that even while we are being pardoned we should feel horror at having
been defiled with sin.

But this aversion must not be used sinfully, as so we have used it. I
have heard of persons saying, when we preach of the blood of Christ, "I
could not bear to hear so much about blood! It quite disgusted me." I
want you to feel shocked because your sin requires such an awful
cleansing–but you must not be shocked at the great Sacrifice, itself!
That would be grievous, indeed, to me and fatal to you! Can you bear,
then, to reject that which, alone, can save you? Are you so delicate
that you turn away from the only cleansing that can purge you from
soul-destroying stains? Dare you count the blood of the Covenant to be
a common, or even a disgusting, thing? I pray you be not so profane!
Let a holy tremor seize you as you see the Crucified and watch the
pouring forth of His heart's life-stream! Smite on your breast as you
look on Him whom you have pierced!

Grieve that your sin should require such a dread Atonement. Lament that
you should be guilty of such a horrible thing that even God's own
brightest One must bleed before transgression, with all its scarlet
dye, could be washed out. Always love and reverence the blood of Jesus
Christ, as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot. The types of the
old Law were meant to excite horror of sin and awe in the presence of
its atonement. It must have been almost a shocking thing to enter into
the tabernacle at the time of the great sacrifices and, indeed, at any
time, for year after year there never passed a day without blood being
sprinkled on the holy curtains. All around, wherever the worshipper
came, he saw tokens of the slaughter of bullocks and goats and calves
and rams. Everywhere he saw that God could not be approached without
atonement–atonement by sacrificial death.

The priests threw the blood of victims in bowls at the foot of the
altar and "almost all things were, by the Law, purged with blood"–and
all to make man see that God saw something horrible in sin which only
death could hide–and that sin was so intolerable to Him that, unless a
propitiation had been made, it had not been possible for His pure and
holy mind to speak with man at all, or hold amicable conversation with
Him. If the aversion which seems natural to us at the sight of blood
should lead us to shudder at the cause of its shedding, it will be
well.

I beg you, now, to come with me to Calvary and see that great sight,
even Jesus Christ, Himself, offered up as a Sacrifice for guilty men!
Herein is a marvelous thing! We have heard so often of it that we do
not note the miracle of it as we ought to do. But it is the most
marvelous thing that ever happened, that ever can happen, or that ever
can be imagined to happen–

that He who always lives, even God, Himself, should deign to take into
union with Himself a body like our own and that, being found in fashion
as a man, He should become obedient to death, even the death of the
Cross! All former ages are struck dumb with astonishment at this
novelty of love–the bleeding Son of God! And all the ages that are yet
to come shall look back to Calvary as the center of all the wonders
that even the wonder-working God, Himself, has ever worked!

The blood of Christ is the ruby gem of the ring of love. Infinite
goodness finds its crown in the gift of Jesus for sinners. All God's
mercies shine like stars, but the coming of His own Son to bleed and
die for rebel men is as the sun in the heavens of Divine Grace
outshining and illuminating all! It surpasses thought–how, then, shall
I hope worthily to set it forth in words?

I. Of that death and of that blood we shall speak in a fourfold way and
first, we shall take the verse as it would most accurately be
translated–the blood of Jesus Christ is THE BLOOD OF THE EVERLASTING
COVENANT. There cannot be much doubt that the word rendered,
"testament," should be translated, "covenant." It is the word used for
covenant in other passages and though our translators have used the
word, "testament," many critics go the length of questioning whether
the word can bear that meaning at all. I think they are too rigid in
their criticism and that it does bear that meaning in this very chapter
but, still, all must admit that the first and most usual meaning of the
word is, "covenant."

Therefore, we will begin with that reading and consider the blood of
Jesus as the blood of the Covenant. First, looking from the Cross to
the Covenant, the blood proves the intense earnestness of God in
entering into covenant with man in a way of Grace. The Covenant of
Grace is on this wise–the well-beloved Son of God stood as our
Representative, as the second Adam, heading up in Himself all those
whom the Father gave Him. He covenanted with God on our behalf that He
would vindicate the broken Law and that He would also keep it in every
jot and tittle on our behalf. As for the Father, He covenanted that
because of the Sacrifice which the Son would offer and the obedience
which He would render, He would put away the sin of His people and they
should be accepted in love.

This is the Covenant of Grace and faithfulness and to show that the
august Covenanters were not playing at covenant-making they sealed the
compact with blood. How dreadfully in earnest was God the Father when
He gave His Son! How deeply in earnest was the Son when He gave His
life! You may play with these things if you dare, but God never will.
You may sprinkle this blood upon the threshold where it should never
fall and trample on it with careless feet, but God only sees it in the
place of honor–on the lintel and the side posts–and looks upon it as
something precious beyond all price! Sinner, you, perhaps, think that
God will not really forgive you and that His promises may only charm
your ears to cheat your heart–but it cannot be so!

God is in real earnest! If He did not mean mercy, He would not have
given up His beloved Son. The best possession of all His unsearchable
riches was His Only-Begotten and He took Him from His bosom, where He
had dwelt serenely always and bade Him come below that He might live
and die that we might be saved! God is in death-earnest for the
salvation of sinners! Let us speak of the great Atonement which He has
provided with earnest hearts, for it is no light thing. I wish that we
never thought about these things without the deepest possible
solemnity. I wish that never did a preacher speak of them without
heart-breaking emotions and that never did we sing a hymn upon the
great Sacrifice without prostrating our spirits in the dust before the
Most High. Whenever we think of the Atonement, the place whereon we
stand is holy ground. The blood of the Everlasting Covenant proved the
earnestness of the great Covenant-Maker–let us be in earnest, too.

Next, it displayed the supreme love of God to man. Seeing that He
entered into a compact of Grace with man, He would let man see how His
very heart went forth with every word of promise and, therefore, He
gave up that which was the center of His heart, namely, Jesus Christ.
When Jesus wept over the grave of Lazarus, they said, "Behold how He
loved him!" But when God gave His Only-Begotten to bleed over the grave
of our race, we may more heartily say, "Behold how He loved us!"
Brothers and Sisters, we have but a faint idea of how much the Lord our
God loves us! "God commends His love toward us in that, while we were
yet sinners, Christ died for us."

There was nothing lovable in us–we were enemies to God, polluted and
polluting! There was everything in us that was obnoxious to the holy
mind of God and yet, because of the riches of His Grace and the
supremacy of His mercy, He would love us and He did love us without
limit! Passing by fallen angels, the Sovereign Lord looked on the
humbler creature, man, and so loved him that He gave up Jesus, Himself,
to die on his behalf! Oh that we were touched with some kind of
tenderness towards God when we think of this! Man, has God shown such
love to man and do you show such coldness to your God? Jesus dies in
unutterable agonies that the guilty may be pardoned and do the guilty
turn aside as if it were noth-

ing to them that Jesus should die? Can men treat the Cross as if it
were either a fiction or a trifle? God has manifested His love in the
death of Christ in a way which must have astonished every inhabitant of
Heaven–and it ought to ravish every native of this lower globe! May
the Holy Spirit enable us, as we think of this blood of the Covenant,
to behold the earnestness of God and to admire the intensity of His
love.

The blood of the Covenant, next, speaks to us and confirms the Divine
faithfulness. The main object of thus sealing the Covenant with blood
is to cause it to be "ordered in all things and sure." Men, in old
times, when they made compacts that were intended to be solemnly
observed, slaughtered certain beasts as a sacrifice and, when blood was
thus spilt, there was no drawing back from the engagements. It was a
covenant made by cutting or dividing–they split the animals in two and
then those who made the covenant passed in between the divided pieces.
No revocation was permitted where agreements were thus ratified. It was
a sort of registered contract that never could be changed when once
there had been a sacrifice to confirm it.

Now it is also so with the Covenant of Grace. It is impossible for God
to ever draw back from the Covenant of Grace, or to change it in any of
its particulars. He needed not to be held in this manner, for He cannot
lie–but that we might have strong consolation who have fled for refuge
to Christ Jesus, He has been pleased to give His Covenant this seal.
Well do we sing–

"The Gospel bears my spirit up!

A faithful and unchanging God

Lays the foundation for my hope,

In oath and covenant and blood." It would be blasphemy to suppose that
God would be false to a treaty sealed with the blood of His own Son! A
doubt about the love of God and about the faithfulness of God is
treason against Him, for it impugns His faithfulness and treats Him as
a liar, or a covenant-breaker, which He can never be. We may think
lightly of the dark mistrusts and suspicions of our hearts, but they
are no light things, after all, for they virtually impugn the sealing
power of the blood and question the faithfulness of God to the Covenant
which has most solemnly been confirmed.

Oh you that seek after peace through Jesus Christ, it is not possible
that God should refuse to accept you if you come to Him through the
blood of Jesus, for that were to break His Covenant! Oh you who are
resting in Jesus, it is not possible that your Father should ever
forsake you, or suffer you to perish, for that were to make the
blood-shedding of Christ to be void and His Sacrifice to be of no
effect! Oh, blessed Covenant, how sure you are, now that the blood of
Jesus is shed! But the blood of the Everlasting Covenant is more than
this–it is a guarantee to us of its infinite provision. There can be
nothing lacking for a soul redeemed by Christ between here and Heaven,
for He that spared not His own Son, how shall He not, with Him, also
freely give us all things? All that the Christian needs on the road to
Glory will be quite inconsiderable compared with what He has already
received in the gift of Jesus Christ!

Do you believe that God will deny you any necessary thing, O Heart,
when He has already made His Son bleed for you? If He had held back
anything, it would have been that costly alabaster box of His Son's
body which contained the most precious ointment that ever perfumed
earth or Heaven! But since He broke that precious casket and poured out
the priceless contents, He will deny you nothing! No good thing will He
withhold from you! He would break up Heaven, itself, if you should
require it and pour out the whole creation at your feet if there were
need. Already He has given you His angels to be your servitors and His
courts to be your dwelling place! Yes, and His Throne to be your
shelter–what else do you need? But, if you ask for more, there is more
provided, for He gives you Himself to be your portion. Is not this
enough? Is not this all? When He gave you His Son, He gave you all, for
His Son is One with Him! Oh, the breadth and length, the height and
depth of Covenant provisions! That roll of love which has for its seal
this precious thing, the blood of Jesus, must contain treasures beyond
all estimate. God will supply all our needs according to His riches in
Glory by Christ Jesus and the blood of Jesus secures this fact!

I will not dwell longer upon this blood of the Covenant except to say
that this blood manifests the depth of the need which the Covenant was
meant to meet. Many preachers, nowadays, seem determined to bring
everything in God's Word down to their own little scale. They carry a
ruler in their pockets with which to measure up eternal things. They
have found out that everlasting does not mean unending–they will one
day find out, I dare say–that infinite does not mean unlimited! Sin
with them is an inconsiderable offense which it is not worth while to
make a fuss about. Man, according to their account, is a poor creature
who is struggling to be right and his offenses are the excusable
blunders of a well-meaning

child–the errors of a poor creature who cannot help making mistakes.
Of course the punishment of sin, with them, is frittered away and they
claim to do this in the name of benevolence, as if it were benevolence
to flatter and a good deed to make sin appear less hazardous and to
take away the moral sanctions which God has set as barriers against
evil.

It follows, in the nature of things, that the Atonement becomes, with
them, a very shadowy affair–something or other which in some way or
other reconciles us to God, or has some bearing upon our standing with
the Divine Being. Nobody knows quite what it is–a misty, hazy, smoky
nothing, which they cannot quite deny–but which they forget as much as
possible. Brothers and Sisters, I believe in a great Revelation and, to
my mind, it is clear that if God, Himself, must become Incarnate and if
when He is Incarnate nothing else will do but that He must be nailed to
a Cross and die like a felon–there must have been some awful mischief
to remove! The race of man must have fallen, indeed, to need such an
expedient as this in order to restore it to holiness and God! If I
measure the disease by the Remedy, I conclude that the disease must
have been deadly! And if, when Christ stood in man's place, being
perfectly innocent–if nothing else would do as the substitutionary
pain but that He should cry, "My God, My God, why have You forsaken
Me?"–then the desert of sin must have been dire, indeed!

In the presence of Calvary and its Christ I am persuaded that sin must
be an evil so great that it is not possible to exaggerate its horrors!
Oh sons of men, your transgressions are black, indeed, since they can
only be expiated by such a sacrifice! Oh sinful creatures, you required
a dying God to save you! You cannot be safe for eternity, you cannot be
happy with God in this life unless the precious blood of Jesus Christ
washes you! Deceive not yourselves with the notion that perhaps your
moralities and your outward religiousness may suffice, or that your
good intentions may be liberally interpreted! You must, if you would be
acceptable with God, feel the sprinkling of the blood of the Son of
God, for without shedding of blood there is no remission of sins! This
much comes to us as the teaching of the blood of the Everlasting
Covenant–if we are in covenant with God we shall know the power of the
Atonement of Christ.

II. But now, secondly, you will bear with me while I take our
translator's own words–"This is THE BLOOD OF THE TESTAMENT." Upon the
whole, our translation is as nearly perfect as we can look for a human
work to be. I do not know what the new translation will turn out to be,
but the good men will have to have risen up very early and sat up very
late if they have produced a version which will surpass that which has
so long been used among us. I do not know. I cannot tell because I have
not seen it. But this translation very well satisfies me at present and
I notice that whenever the translators use a word which is disputed by
scholars, they have excellent reasons for it and the more the matter is
looked into, the more is their judgment valued.

They thought a good deal before they settled on their expressions and
as a rule they came to a sound conclusion. In this case there are
reasons and very good reasons, why the word, "testament," should be
used. Our translators were not inspired, but they were marvelously
guided and directed when they made this version and we may be content
to take the text as it stands before us. Jesus Christ has made a will
and He has left to His people large legacies by that will. Now, wills
do not need to be sprinkled with blood, but wills do need that the
testator should be dead, otherwise they are not of force. As it was not
possible that Christ should die other than a violent death, seeing He
must die as a Sacrifice, the expression, "blood," becomes, in His case,
tantamount to, "death."

And so, first of all, the blood of Jesus Christ on Calvary is the blood
of the Testament, because it is a proof that He is dead and, therefore,
the testament is in force. If there is a question about whether a man
is alive or not, you cannot administer to his estate, but when you have
certain evidence that the testator has died, then the will stands. So
is it with the blessed Gospel–if Jesus did not die, then the Gospel is
null and void! Not without the sprinkled blood does the promise of
salvation become yes and amen! Inasmuch as the soldier with a spear
pierced His side and forthwith came blood and water, there was the
clearest evidence in that blood that Jesus was really dead and that His
testament is valid and operative. Therein do we rejoice, for though we
sorrow that He died, yet we are glad that His legacy of love is all our
own! He has died and lives again, no more to die!

Out of the thick cloud of blackest grief which veils our dying Lord,
there falls a silver shower of peace more refreshing than all the
brooks of earth can yield–the certainty of our eternal life is proven
by the certainty of Jesus' death! His blood is the blood of the
Testament because it proves the testator's death. It is the blood of
the Testament, again, because it is the seal of His being seized and
possessed of those goods which He has bequeathed to us, for, apart from
His Sacrifice, our Lord had no spiritual blessings to present to
us–His death has filled the treasury of His Grace. He has pardon to
bestow and

justifying righteousness to give because He died! If He had not shed
His blood, He would not have completed His part of the Covenant, nor
have fulfilled the will of God. But when He died, with, "It is
finished!" upon His lips, then His blood became the seal that Covenant
mercies were His own and that they were His to leave to us. Oh treasure
up the death of Jesus in your hearts, Believers, for, inasmuch as He
has enriched you and given you all things necessary for this life of
godliness, He has done this out of His own proper stores which were
given Him as the reward of His passion!

The blood of the Testament, again, is a direction as to His legatees.
We see who are benefited under His will. To whom did Jesus Christ
leave, by will, the blessings of Grace? He must have left them to the
guilty because He has left a will that is signed and sealed in blood
and blood is for the remission of sin. Jesus has made His testament in
the character of a sin-atoning Sacrifice and we can only share in it by
regarding Him under that character. If I am not a sinner, I have no
interest in the legacy of a bleeding Redeemer! The blood-mark proves
that the testament was made for those who need atonement by blood and
that its legacies are bequeathed to sinners. This is one of the most
humbling and yet most blessed of all the Truths of God. It casts down
and yet lifts up!

If I have any Grace or any Covenant blessing, it did not come to me
because I was heir to it by nature, or because I had purchased it, or
because of any intrinsic right in myself–but because Jesus, when He
died, had a right to make His will as He pleased and He did so make it
that He would give Himself and all that He had to such a poor, needy,
empty, lost and guilty sinner as I am! Not because of any good in us do
these blessings come to us, but all of our Lord's good will, who made
the Testament of Love and sealed it with His heart's blood! Brethren,
the legatees in Christ's will are those who come and accept His
Atonement. There is nothing in Christ's will for any person who will
not trust His blood. I know of no mercy under Heaven for any man who,
knowing of the atoning Sacrifice, willfully refuses it!

Certain teachers talk about a "larger hope." I read nothing of this
fancy in the Scriptures and I dare not go beyond the Word of the Lord
and I am content to say with Moses, "The secret things belong unto the
Lord our God; but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to
our children forever." "Other foundation can no man lay than that which
is laid, which is Jesus Christ." Other hopes, large or small, I know
not of from Revelation, except this one–"He that believes in Him is
not condemned." "The blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanses us from
all sin." "He that believes in Him has everlasting life, but he that
believes not is condemned already, because he has not believed in the
name of the Only-Begotten Son

of God."

Thus, the blood of the Testament is a direction as to the legatees.
And, as I said before, what an index it is of the value of the
legacies, since even the seal upon the will is no less in value than
the heart's blood of the heir of all things! What treasures must be
ours under such a Covenant! What riches are yours and mine, my Brothers
and Sisters, if we are really trusting in Jesus!

III. But now, in the third place, I must speak for a minute or two upon
that blood from another point of view. IT WAS THE BLOOD OF CLEANSING.
"This is the blood of the Testament which God has enjoined unto you."
Moses sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle and all the vessels of
the ministry–the object of the sprinkled blood was to purify so that
the Book and the people and all things upon whom the blood fell might
be allowed to stand in the Presence of the thrice holy God, being
regarded by Him as cleansed. Think of this for a short time. This blood
of the Covenant or of the Testament is a blood of purification to us.
Wherever it is accepted by faith, it takes away all past guilt. Wonder
of wonders! Years of sin vanish in a moment–encrustations of guilt
disappear in a single instant and man, up to now guilty and
con-demned–is rendered perfectly clean in God's sight and accepted in
the Beloved because he believes in Christ Jesus!

So priceless a Sacrifice as that of the Son of God is of boundless
efficacy for the eternal removal of all evil once and for all. And this
is but the beginning of our purification, for that same blood applied
by faith takes away from the pardoned sinner the impurity which had
been generated in his nature by habit. He ceases to love the sin which
once he delighted in– he begins to loathe that which was formerly his
choice joy. A love of purity is born within his nature–he sighs to be
perfect and he groans to think there should be about him tendencies
towards evil. Temptations which once were welcomed are now resisted.
Habits which were once most fascinating are an annoyance to his spirit.
The precious blood, when it touches the conscience, removes all sense
of guilt and when it touches the heart it kills the ruling power of
sin!

The more fully the power of the blood is felt, the more does it kill
the power of sin within the soul. I hope you are feeling it to be so.
We ought to be ashamed, Brothers and Sisters, if we allow those sins to
conquer us, now, which overcame us years ago! We ought to possess a
growing strength against iniquity, a growing abhorrence of everything
that is evil and a

growing likeness to Christ–and it will be so if this precious blood is
really operating upon our nature and imparting to it a fullness of
life–

"The Cross once seen is death to e very vice Else He that died there
suffered all His pain, Bled, groaned, agonized and died in vain." If
you are in any measure failing as to holiness, fly to the blood for
help! Perhaps you have not thought enough, of late, of the dying love
of your Lord. His death has a living power about it to breed and
nourish holiness within you. Remember there is no slaying sin but by
nailing it to the Cross. Only the lance which pierced the heart of
Jesus can kill the love of sin. You must overcome through the blood of
the Lamb–there is no other way for victory!

You will never avoid sin merely by believing it to be your duty to do
so–the Law points the way, but cannot bear us along it. A sense of the
great love of Christ to you in bearing your sin in His body on the
Cross and so removing it from you will give you power to rise superior
to temptation. It is charged against some of us, as preachers, that we
do not urge men enough to their duties. We deny the charge and yet we
claim that we do better, for we touch secret springs that nerve to duty
and we point to the strength by which virtuous deeds are done! The
acceptance of the Atonement is the great source of virtue. The Grace of
God is seen in the Atonement of Jesus, by which sin is put away and
thus the heart is won to God and led by gratitude to obey Him. The
blood of Jesus is the strongest restraint from transgression.

We say to the pardoned–Will you so dishonor the blood which cleanses
you as to go and live in sin? Will you go back to that from which you
have been redeemed by the death of your Savior? Will you roll, again,
in that foul mire out of which Christ has lifted you and so do despite
to the blood which cleanses you and make it to be to you as an unholy
thing? It must not be! Let but the heart feel the power of the blood of
Jesus and it will growingly aspire after holiness and increasingly seek
it! The precious blood is our great security from backsliding, for by
it we obtain daily access to God! It keeps the Christian from grievous
relapses and preserves him unto the coming of his Lord. Wherever the
blood of Jesus Christ is really applied, perfection must be its
ultimate result. There will be battling and striving, but there must be
victory before long! The holier a man becomes, the more he mourns over
his unholiness.

The operations of Grace in his soul make him detect the more readily
the motions of sin in his members. There is not the sin within him that
there was, but he sees that which is there more clearly and, therefore,
he is more than ever grieved about it. No one calls himself so much a
wretched man because sin is within him as he does who is also a
thankful man, because God gives him the victory. You must not judge
that you are not growing in sanctification because you are not
increasing in your sense of it. Your sense of your own holiness is a
poor test, a very doubtful index of your state. Brothers and Sisters,
if you have really fixed your trust in the atoning blood and known its
power, you are destined to perfection and all the devils in Hell cannot
keep you from it! As sure as you believe, you shall one day stand
white-robed among the host that know no discord in their song, no
wandering in their walk!

From this spot where I have preached the Word I must, as a Believer,
rise to a higher spot where I shall prove the power of Jesus' blood in
an immortality of perfection! And from that pew where you sit,
believing in the precious blood, you, also, must pass onward through
your pilgrimage until you, also, reach the fullness of eternal life,
for your Lord has pledged Himself to keep all those whom the Father has
given Him and you are among them if, indeed, you believe in Him! Those
who are justified shall also be glorified! All Believers shall yet
dwell at the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens where there is
pleasure forevermore because there is perfection without alloy! May we
all, through the Spirit, by the blood of purging be made whiter than
snow!

IV. And then, to close, it is THE BLOOD OF DEDICATION. On the day when
Moses sprinkled the blood of the Covenant on the people and on the
Book, it was meant to signify that they were a chosen people set apart
unto God's service. The blood made them holiness unto the Lord. Moses
stood upon an elevated place and took the scarlet wool and hyssop and
sprinkled the blood on all sides. Try and realize a part of the scene,
A man just beneath him is wearing a white robe and a spot of blood has
fallen upon it. He sees it. There it is! Will he not prize the crimson
sign? I would have preserved that robe as long as I lived and the blood
spot, too!

But what would it mean? To the Israelite it meant consecration to God.
He would say, "The blood of the Covenant has fallen upon me and I am,
therefore, a consecrated man dedicated to God." Now, unless the blood
is upon you, my Brother or Sister, you are not saved! But if you are
saved, you are, by that very fact, set apart to be God's servant. "You
are not

your own, you are bought with a price." "You were not redeemed with
corruptible things as with silver and gold, but with the precious blood
of Christ." A saved man is a bought man–the property of Jesus!
Believer, not a hair on your head belongs to you–you belong to Jesus
Christ as His servant as surely as you are redeemed by His blood! Now
you are set apart! God's own mark is put upon you!

You have believed–that believing has applied the blood to you and you
are Christ's. Cannot you see the private token which the Lord has set
on you? Do you not feel it? Oh, then, acknowledge its claims in your
daily life! Being so set apart, you are, therefore, ordained with due
solemnity to be a servant of God, even as Aaron and his sons were
consecrated to their priesthood. I have been sometimes asked, "Were you
ever ordained?" Yes, I was. Not by the laying on of the hands of any
mortal man, but by that precious blood whose purchase-power I feel.
When that blood fell upon me and I rejoiced in its cleansing power, I
longed, at once, to tell of its efficacy to others. I hope I can say
most honestly to my Lord–

"Ever since by faith I saw the stream

Your flowing wounds supply,

Redeeming lo ve has been my theme,

And shall be tiil I die!"

That same blood has fallen on you, Brother, Sister, and it has ordained
you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should
remain. Is it not written, "You were slain and have been made unto our
God kings and priests"? The slaying of Christ is the ground of our
priesthood and the claim for our perpetual service. Let us praise,
forever, the Lord who has worked everlasting redemption for us! If we
have not Milton's power of song, at least let us come to the same
resolve at which he arrived–

"O unexampled love! Lo ve no where to be found less than Divine!

Hail, Son of God, Savior of men, Your name

Shall be the copious matter of my song

Henceforth and never shall my harp Your praise

Forget, nor from Your Father's praise disjoin." Because of all this we
are to lead a separated life. It is not for us to live as others live
who walk in the vanity of their minds. We are not to seek the world's
pleasures. We are not to besmear ourselves with its folly and its
selfishness. God's people, if they act as they should, are a separated
people. It is written, "The people shall dwell alone, they shall not be
numbered among the nations." The Lord has set apart him that is godly
for Himself and as the shepherd marks his sheep, so, with the precious
blood of Christ applied by faith, has God marked His own elect, that
they should abide in Christ and go no more out, no more mingling with
the sons of men, nor joying in their joys, nor serving their lusts.

The Lord's portion is His people and His cry to them is, " Come you out
from among them and be you separate." God give you to feel this blood
of the Covenant, this blood of the Testament, this blood of cleansing,
this blood of the setting apart, for Jesus Christ's sake. Amen.
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The Believer Catechized