Jesus Offers The Only Solution To Sin

I will be merciful to their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more.
–Hebrews 8:12

I used to have a Saturday night ritual of polishing my shoes before Sunday morning. I would sit in front of the television set and work on the shoes I planned to wear on Sunday morning. And I remember many times Amy threatening me within an inch of my life, saying, “Don’t do that! You’re going to get flecks of shoe polish on the white carpet.” She made me put out newspapers. So I would have to sit in the middle of the newspapers and work on my shoes. One night, Amy was in the bedroom and I was in the living room, working especially vigorously on my shoes. I was excited about my sermon the next day, so I was really polishing away. And one of those flecks of shoe polish landed on the white carpet. I panicked. What was I going to do? I went over to try to retrieve that errant piece of shoe polish. And as I grabbed it, it smudged on the carpet. Now I was really in a panic. I stealthily creeped through the house to get the spot remover. I took out a cloth, rubbed the spot, and it disappeared! But only for about 45 seconds. Then it came back again. I put on some more spot remover and scrubbed and scrubbed. The spot disappeared–and came back again. I knew I was in for it. I was going to suffer the condemnation that I did not want to experience, all because I could not remove that spot.

That is exactly what animal blood did in the Old Testament sacrificial system, in terms of people’s sins. People offered blood sacrifices in order to blot out their sins. It worked temporarily. But then the stain of sin reappeared. The Bible tells us that Jesus Christ offers the only solution that will dissolve our sin, and that is His blood. In Psalm 103:12, the psalmist said, “As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.” Micah 7:19 says that God “will cast all [our] sins into the depths of the sea.” And in Hebrews 8:12, the writer quoted from the prophet Jeremiah, who said that in the new covenant, the Lord “will remember [our] sins no more.”

I read one time an interesting fact about comets, these heavenly bodies that shoot across our skies occasionally. Have you ever seen a comet go by? Sometimes, comets leave a vapor trail behind them that is 10,000 miles long. Imagine that! Yet, scientists tell us, you can take all of the vapor in that 10,000-mile vapor trail and put it in one cubic inch of a bottle. That is amazing. But I will tell you something even more amazing. God can take every sin you have ever committed and put them in an area no bigger than the cross of Jesus Christ. And when your sin makes contact with the blood of Christ, that sin evaporates. It disappears forever. Isn’t that great news?

That is why we say with confidence that Jesus Christ is the superior priest who has offered a superior sacrifice to obtain a superior salvation. May God be praised!

Today’s devotion is excerpted from “The Real Thing” by Dr. Robert Jeffress, 2018.

Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1960,1962,1963,1968,1971,1972,1973,1975,1977,1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.