HopeLives365

Mark Finley: That's why when our names come up in judgment, we don't tremble in fear. Why not? Because in heaven's sanctuary, there is a record of our sins, but that record is a record of sins covered by the blood of Christ.

Guest (Male): This is HopeLives365 with Pastor Mark Finley. Today's message, Let God Break Your Heart, Part Two. Enjoy and remember you can always catch up with past messages and stay up to date with HopeLives365 and Pastor Mark by going to HopeLives365.com. And now, Pastor Mark Finley.

Mark Finley: So that indeed, a record of sin forgiven. When the individual's sins were transferred to the sanctuary, they were hidden from human view, and nobody could see them because they were covered by the blood of Christ. When we confess our sins, they are hidden from human view. They are hidden from human view; they're in the sanctuary, covered by the blood of Christ.

Now, there's something else that's really fascinating here. Not only was the blood taken into the sanctuary, what happened to the carcass of the animal? What happened to the body of that animal? Most of the body of the animal, in a few instances, some of it was eaten by the priest and brought in, but most of the time it was burned here.

How much of the animal was burned there? All of it. Because when Christ hung on Calvary's cross, He was consumed by sin for us. So all of it was there. What happened when the animal was consumed? There's an interesting word for offering that I just picked up. And you know what that word for offering is? The Hebrew word for offering has the idea of ascension, ascending, ascending.

So Christ, the sacrificial Lamb for us, the smoke ascends as a sweet perfume to God, and Christ dies on Calvary's cross. He lies in the tomb, and on Sunday morning He's resurrected, and He ascends to heaven as our sacrifice, just like He was consumed in type in the sanctuary, just like in type the smoke ascended, He ascended.

Now, here's an amazing truth. Jesus resurrected from the dead. He's getting ready to ascend to heaven. And just as He's there, getting ready to ascend to heaven, Mary comes. She has tears running down her face. She thinks that a gardener has stolen away the body of Christ. And Jesus says, "Mary, touch me not, for I have not yet," what's the next word? "Ascended" to my Father.

The most significant event after the cross in the history of the universe is to take place. Christ is to ascend to heaven and appear before the universe, indicating that His blood settles the controversy between good and evil, that all humanity can be forgiven, that all humanity can enter into the gates of heaven.

He has the most significant announcement to make to the universe, and He's going to ascend to heaven after His crucifixion. He's been there, gone thirty-three and a half years, but He's ascended to heaven. But look, He stops and does not ascend because one of His children is crying and brokenhearted. He thinks so much of Mary that the whole universe must wait until He comforts her. What a Christ, what a wonderful Savior is Jesus, my Lord. He knows when your heart is broken. He knows when the sword has pierced through your heart. He knows when sorrow fills your eyes. He knows when tears run down your face, and the living Christ pauses before the whole universe to speak hope and courage to your heart.

The Bible says, Psalm 32:1, blessed is the man. That's the Hebrew word "asher." It means happy, contented, full of joy, full of peace. Blessed is the man whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Covered with what? Covered with the blood of Christ. To know that you're forgiven, to know that you're justified by His blood, to know that you are His child makes all the difference in all the world.

You know, Hebrews 10:4 says it's not possible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins. So it's not possible that some human sacrifice... but what was God's intent with all this? God's intent was to show us through this about the sacrifice of Jesus. In all ages, man's only hope has been the Jesus Christ, the true sacrifice.

In all of the ages, Satan's tried to condemn us. In all the ages, Satan has tried to make us feel unworthy. In all the ages, Satan has tried to make us feel that we cannot make it. But all the ages, the sanctuary message says to us, you can make it, my brother. You can make it, my sister.

One night Martin Luther went to sleep, and as he went to sleep, he had a dream. And in that dream, he saw Satan in his dream. Some people think it was a vision of Satan coming down to Luther, but he describes it as a dream. And he said in that dream, it was all darkness, and Satan opens up this scroll, and on that scroll are sins and sins and sins and sins.

Satan opens the scroll and he says, "Martin, is this the scroll of your sin?" And Martin looks back, sees what he did as a sixteen-year-old and as a twelve-year-old and as a twenty-one-year-old, and he says, "I have to admit these are my sins." And then Satan says to him, "Is the wages of sin death?" And Luther says, "Yes, the wages of sin are death."

Then there's no hope for you. And Luther says he's there in his bed, it's dark at night, and he's just trembling, he's just shaking. He says, "There's no hope for me." And then he notices that Satan's hand is over something. And Luther looks at the devil in his dream and he says, "Move your hand." The devil refuses. "In the name of Jesus Christ, move your hand." Satan moves his hand, and above his sins are these words: "By the blood of Christ, Luther is forgiven."

If we confess our sins, He's what? Faithful and just. In all ages, man's only hope has been Jesus, the true sacrifice. The hope is not in you. The hope is not in me. The hope is not in our good works, because whatever good works you perform, they're not good enough, because heaven requires perfection.

We come to Christ. His grace forgives us. His grace pardons us. We come as we are, and He changes us, and He begins to work out in us His own character. But God always takes the initiative in salvation. He takes the initiative on the cross. He takes the initiative through His Holy Spirit. He takes the initiative to work in our lives to transform us.

John says in John 1:29, "Behold, the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world." When you behold Christ on the cross, when you behold the perfection of His life, when you behold His love, when you behold His amazing grace, when you behold His goodness and mercy, something happens inside of you. It changes you, it makes you over again.

1 Peter 2:24 says who His own self bears our sins in His own body on the tree. Jesus bears the guilt that we could not bear. Christ's grace is unmerited, it's undeserved, and it's unearned. That which motivates us to serve Him is what He has first done for us.

If you begin trying to live the Christian life with the outer, you will always fail. If you say, "I'm going to grit my teeth and clinch my fist and be obedient to God if it kills me," it may kill you because the stress of your life will drive you crazy because you will find that in your own strength it is impossible.

But if you behold the Lamb of God, and you see that His grace is unmerited, that it is undeserved, that it's unearned, and you fill your heart and your mind with His goodness, His mercy, His compassion, and His love, something happens inside of you. It breaks your heart because you see He died the death that was ours so that we could live the life that was His.

He is the Lamb that was slain for the sins of the world. The dying Lamb speaks of a love so amazing, so divine, that it would rather take the guilt and penalty of sin upon itself than ever have one of His children be eternally lost. Many people when they study the Christian faith miss this point, and this point is the very heart of the Christian faith, and it's this.

In 2 Corinthians 5:21, the scripture says He that hath no sin became sin for us. Did Jesus ever sin? Never. But did Jesus become sin for us? He did. Galatians 3:13 says this: "Cursed is everyone that hangs on the tree." So what killed Jesus was not the nails through His hands, not the crown of thorns upon His head. What killed Him, Hebrews 2:8 says He tasted death for every man. So Jesus bore the guilt of every sin ever committed from the days of Adam on the cross. The magnified guilt of that broke His heart. That's why Jesus said, "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?"

Guest (Male): You're listening to HopeLives365. We'll be right back. And if you like what you're hearing, we invite you to check out our website, HopeLives365.com. There you can find many ministry resources, encouraging messages, and even a link to our HopeLives365 YouTube ministry. And of course, an opportunity to sow into this valuable ministry. Find out more by going to HopeLives365.com. That's HopeLives365.com. And now, back to Pastor Mark Finley.

Mark Finley: What did He mean by that? He was dying the death of a condemned sinner. He was experiencing the weeping and gnashing of teeth. If Jesus only died the first death, there is no salvation for the second death. What is the second death? It is the conscious sense of abandonment from the presence of God forever.

So when Jesus was hanging on the cross, although He had previously said, "Destroy this body and in three days I'll raise it up again," when He was hanging on the cross He could not see Himself coming through the tomb. The darkness of the tomb surrounded Him, and He was dying the death that the sinner would die.

In other words, He was willing, if necessary, to go into the grave and never come out for you. He was willing to be separated from the Father forever. That is a love beyond human comprehension. There's nothing like that in Buddhism, there's nothing like that in Islam, there's nothing like that in Hinduism, there's nothing like that in any religion in the world: that God comes and is willing to give up all eternity for you and for me.

So there's a wonderful statement in a book called *Desire of Ages*. You know, in the Library of Congress there are well over five thousand books on the life of Christ. In 1948, W. E. Beaumont, who was the librarian in the Library of Congress, was asked what's the most significant book on the life of Christ? He said there are many, but for spiritual insight for me, I'd take the book *Desire of Ages*.

In that book on the life of Christ, there's a statement that really touches my heart: so great was His, this agony that Christ experienced on the cross, that physical pain was hardly felt. Satan with his fierce temptations wrung the heart of Jesus. Don't you think Satan was saying to Jesus, "It's not going to be worth it. Give this up. Call ten thousand angels. Give it up"?

Satan with his fierce temptations wrung the heart of Jesus. The Savior could not see through the portals of the tomb. Hope did not present to Him His coming forth from the grave a conqueror or tell Him of the Father's acceptance of the sacrifice. He feared that sin was so offensive to God that their separation was to be eternal.

So Christ hanging on that cross was, His heart was wrenched, it was torn apart because He had existed with the Father from all eternity, and He feared that their separation would be eternal. Christ felt the anguish. This is what the Bible teaches, that the sinner will feel when mercy shall no longer plead for the guilty race. It was the sense of sin bringing the Father's wrath upon Him as the sinner's substitute that made the cup He drank so bitter and broke the heart of the Son of God.

And He says, "Father, if that's what it takes to save Mark Finley, if I have to go into the grave and never ever come out to put him in heaven forever..." Love so divine, that is the story. It is the story of grace, the story of a Savior's love beyond measure. It's beyond human comprehension. Sin brought all of heaven pain.

And that's why the man who sought forgiveness when he slew that sacrifice must see the pain in the lamb, so he could sense the pain that was in the divine Son of God. And that's why Zechariah 12:10, as we read last night, says when they look on Him whom they've pierced, they shall mourn for Him as one mourns for his only child and weep bitterly over him as one weeps for his firstborn.

When we really understand the cross, when we really understand the magnificence of His love, when we really understand the majesty of His grace, when we really understand what He did for us, we say, "Lord, I want to turn loose of sin. I don't want to do anything that brings suffering and pain to your heart."

Some time ago, there was a young couple sitting in a funeral. It was one of the saddest funerals you could possibly imagine. They sat there in the front row. They looked at the casket of their five-year-old boy. What made it doubly, triply, quadruply painful was the father had killed his own son.

Father backed up the car and backed it up over his son, and that boy was killed instantly. You can imagine the brokenheartedness of that father. You can imagine the sorrow of that father. You can imagine how at that funeral that father just wept and wept. But when you and I come to Calvary, we face an infinitely greater tragedy, for we see Jesus slain not by accident, but by our deliberate sin. And we say, "Jesus, if that's the cost to sin, I want to turn loose of it. If that's the cost of sorrow, I want to turn loose of it."

I love that song, that poem by John Newton, that once wicked slave trader who came to Jesus, and he writes: "In evil long I took delight, unawed by shame or fear, till a new object met my sight and stopped my wild career. I saw one hanging on a tree in agonies and blood, who fixed His languid eyes on me as near His cross I stood."

Sure never till my latest breath can I forget that look. It seemed to charge me with His death though not a word He spoke. My conscience felt and owned my guilt and plunged me in despair. I saw my sins His blood had spilt and helped to nail Him there. Alas, I knew not what I did, but now my tears are vain. Where shall my trembling soul be hiding, for I the Lord have slain.

A second look He gave, which said I freely all forgive. This blood is for thy ransom paid; I die that thou mayest live. Thus while His death my sin displays in all its blackest hue, such is the mystery of grace, it seals my pardon too.

Coming to that cross, we find what our sin did to Jesus, but we find mercy, we find grace, we find pardon. One of the great purposes of the sanctuary service was to reveal the cost of sin. Every sacrifice offered reveals that sin had its price. And although Jesus offers salvation freely, it cost heaven everything. Jesus gave a ransom for you that's far beyond comprehension.

James 1:15 says sin when it's finished brings forth what? It brings forth death. The reason pain, sin brings such pain to God is because He knows ultimately it will bring forth death. Our sins nailed Him there. And it's the blood that makes atonement for the soul; without the blood of the Lamb, no forgiveness. That blood pointed forward to Christ; without His blood, there is no forgiveness.

But there's one final act, and it's this. When the priest came out of the sanctuary, one final act in that courtyard. When the priest came out of the sanctuary, he gave to the sinner a knife, and the sinner must do one more thing with the dead carcass of the lamb. Here's what it is.

Leviticus 4:31: "And he shall take away all the fat thereof, as the fat is taken away from the sacrifice of the peace offerings." So the sinner took the knife of the priest. He had to then, as he had killed the lamb, he had to go and he had to carve all the fat out of that lamb. The fat represents sin. "The priest shall burn the fat upon the altar for a sweet savor unto the Lord, and the priest shall make atonement for him, and it shall be forgiven him."

The person had confessed their sin, the blood went into the sanctuary, but the person had to be determined that they were going to give up sin and give up that thing. So they had to take the knife and cut the fat out, which represents sin. When we come to Christ, we don't come saying, "Oh, Jesus, just forgive my sin but I'm going to go do that same thing again. I'm going to live like that way again like I have." No.

In our imagination, we say, "Lord, I want to be done with that thing. I want the Holy Spirit with the sword of the Spirit and the knife of God's word to cut that sin out of my life." This act in the sanctuary service powerfully illustrates that we must cooperate with God in allowing the Spirit to speak to our hearts and take away those things that are not in harmony with His will.

The fat that is burned by the priest is a type of the final destruction of all sin and all wickedness because when that fat is burned, it is a symbol that at the end all sin will be burned up and all sin will be consumed. Psalm 37:20: "The wicked shall do what? Perish, and the enemies of the Lord shall be as the fat of lambs. They shall consume; in smoke and they shall consume away."

The message of the sinner trimming the fat is a solemn warning and an urgent appeal. It's an appeal by Christ to you and to me. It's an appeal to come with our Lamb, to know that we can be forgiven. But it's also an appeal to say stop fooling around with sin. Stop playing games with God. Stop cherishing those things in your heart. Come, Jesus will forgive you. Come and say, "Jesus, take the fat of sin out of my life."

Guest (Male): You've been listening to HopeLives365 with Pastor Mark Finley. We hope you've enjoyed today's message and remind you that you can find more in our many ministry resources at HopeLives365.com. And you can support this ministry by going to HopeLives365.com/donate. And now, a final thought from Pastor Mark.

Mark Finley: As the song says, I was wandering down a path to nowhere, but then Christ reached out. Christ touched me, Christ forgave me, Christ changed me. Oh Jesus, cut the fat of sin out of my life by your Holy Spirit so I can be a new man, so I can be a new woman. That grace pardons us. That grace is His unmerited favor. That grace is His goodness and His love.

But that grace not only pardons us, but that grace changes us. You can never come to the cross and be the same again. Because at the cross we find what sin has done to God, and His love flowing from the cross moves in our hearts and changes our lives. Do you want to bow your heads with me just now and say, "Jesus, I thank you for your grace and forgiveness. Change me inside. Make me the person you want me to be"?

Our Father in heaven, we thank you tonight for your grace, for your goodness, for your mercy. We thank you for your love. We thank you for that blood that pardons our sin. We thank you there's no condemnation in Christ, and we thank you that although we come to the cross as we are, your love changes us and breaks our hearts. And that at the cross there's power to be different people. And we praise you for that, and we leave here singing of the grace and goodness of our God in Christ's name, amen.