since he had [then] been obliged often to suffer from the foundation of the world. But now once in the consummation of the ages he has been manifested for [the] putting away of sin by his sacrifice.
Hebrews has just said the earthly sanctuary was only a copy; Christ has entered heaven itself. Verse 26 answers the two questions that follow: why did He not repeat His offering, and why did He come when He did?
The phrase older translations render "the end of the world" is not about the planet burning up. It marks the close of a long stretch of time in which God tested man.
This closes the first Adam's history — the history of man responsible in the flesh. It was the end of the world; that is, in moral terms the world had ended and stood judged. So the apostle speaks in Hebrews 9:26: "Now once in the end of the world." Literally that is "in the end, or consummation, of the ages" — the ages in which God was testing man in responsibility, as a sinner who might still be won back. "He has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself."
That timing is not only an ending. The same act that shut one period opened another.
Until Christ, the question of sin was not settled. God was still making every trial of man under responsibility. Whether man had no law or lived under law, sin had come to full growth. Besides, there was no more reason for an age to run on with man under the same responsibility as before. The ages were complete. Christ appears. He closes the earlier period by abolishing sin, and opens new ages for the glory... He appeared (the verb here is in the perfect tense); the fact is past and still stands.
The verse opens with an impossible picture. If Christ's sacrifice had to be repeated, so would His suffering.
Continual repetition was part of the ritual system. Christianity stands in contrast with it. He has offered Himself once and for ever. If He had to offer Himself repeatedly, He must also suffer often. The two things cannot be separated. For then, we read, "he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world." A fresh offering of Christ to God without fresh suffering is not merely a mistake. It is in direct opposition to His word and to the foundation of Christianity.
The word "once" runs through these chapters.
The word which characterises these chapters is "one," "once" (see Heb. 9:12, 26, 28; Heb. 10:2, 10, 12, 14). It comes seven times over, so that we do not miss how sufficient the precious blood of Christ is, and how unique its glory.
Every other sacrifice needed three: the man who brought it, the animal, and the priest. Here all three meet in one person.
The offerer first identified himself with his offering and killed it. Only then did the priest act. So the Lord offered Himself... The offerer, for whom the sacrifice was brought, killed the animal. But the true sacrifice offered up Himself (Heb. 7:27). In reality the offerer, the offering, and the priest are one and the same person. We see Him in three different characters.
Notice the wording: sin, singular. The reach of that is wider than it looks.
Let us mark that phrase, "to put away sin." How comprehensive it is! The payment for our sins is of course included, but it is not limited to that. The judgment of sin is included, but it is not limited to that. It takes in sin in all its branches and bearings. Sin the root, and all the sins that are its fruit. Sin as it has affected man and the earth. Sin as it has affected the heavens. Sin in its totality — all put away by His sacrifice. And His sacrifice was the sacrifice of Himself!
If sin was put away, why is the world still full of it?
What is the meaning of Hebrews 9:26, "Christ put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself"? I believe it extends to the new heavens and new earth, where righteousness dwells... The work that accomplishes it is done, but the power is not yet put forth. In Hebrews 9:26, 28 we get two things: "to put away sin" and "sins borne." We get the same two on the Day of Atonement — the sin offering and the scapegoat.
Because the sacrifice cannot be repeated, the standing it gives cannot be revised.
If all our sins had not been cancelled by this one offering, they could never be, for Christ cannot die again... When a person believes, he comes into this blessing. He is for ever perfected in Christ before God. Sin cannot be charged to him, because Christ, who has borne and paid for it, is always in God's presence for him — a witness that his sins are already put away.
- Once — in time. He appeared at the close of the ages in which God tested man. That testing ended in judgment. His appearing opens new ages for glory.
- Once — not often. Repeating the offering would mean repeating the suffering. He has offered Himself once and for ever. "Once" is stamped seven times over these chapters.
- Once — by Himself. Offerer, offering and priest are one Person; He had no victim to bring but Himself.
- Once — for sin itself. Not our sins only, but sin at the root, on earth and in the heavens, in its totality.
- Once — therefore final. The full clearing waits for the new heavens and new earth. For the believer the account is already closed, since Christ cannot die again.
And forasmuch as it is the portion of men once to die, and after this judgment;
Hebrews 9 closes with two fixed appointments side by side: one for man, one for Christ. One line gives the lot of every human being — death once, then judgment — and the next verse answers it with a sacrifice offered once.
The word "appointed" points behind the fact of dying to the One who set it. One writer traces dying back to God's own decree. He also notes that death is not God's verdict on how a person lived:
Death is a judicial ordinance of God. It entered at His bidding as the unwelcome consequence of sin. Yet it is not in this natural end of life that God declares His judgment on the ways of men. For death is the end and limit of corrupted human life, and it has no reference to a person's own sins. People are born to die because of sinful origin and birth. By a general appointment men die once.
Everyone admits that death is certain. Not everyone admits what comes after it. Both rest on the same testimony:
"It is appointed for man to die once" — that is only half the solemn truth. Equally appointed, equally certain: "after that comes judgment." Death, instead of being the end of all, is rather the beginning. This present time is only the waiting-room of eternity. The same God declares death and witnesses to it in countless deaths. He declares just as surely that the judgment is coming.
Because judgment comes after death, death cannot be the extinction of the person:
If there is judgment after death, then men do live after death. Death does not mean ceasing to exist. It means ceasing to exist soul and body together in this world. … The judgment brings on men the whole extent of the consequences of sin from the wrath of God, and it comes after death. … Note, this is not something peculiar to those who have heard of Christ, though they are doubtless far more guilty and will be beaten with many stripes. It is appointed for man. Death and judgment are the common natural portion of all as sinners.
If judgment follows dying, the time to be saved is now. One writer puts it bluntly:
"After that comes judgment," Scripture says. The Bible knows no such thing as a further time of testing after death. That idea is a falsehood — twin to the lie that those who reject Christ get another chance after Jesus comes. … The Scriptures testify that you must be saved before you die, if you are saved at all.
Christ faced the same two things as man, but in the opposite order:
Man gets death first, and after death the judgment. Christ, our blessed Lord, bore the judgment first, going to the cross, bearing wrath. Look at that scene on Calvary. Think about the cries that came from the cross. You will never fully understand the reality of the cross until you have entered into the meaning of those words: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" That is the very thing the ungodly will realise in the judgment.
Since Christ absorbed both, the one who trusts Him no longer stands where verse 27 leaves the race:
"As" what? "Just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment" — that is, to die and bear God's judgment of sin is the lot of man by nature. "So" what? "So Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many" — that is, Christ has taken on the cross these two consequences of sin, death and judgment. … The believer knows now that he has death and judgment behind him at the cross, instead of before him.
These two verses name two different groups, and the contrast is the point:
There is a striking contrast between "men" as such and believers. … If you miss the opposition between "men" as they are now by nature and "those who await Him," you have missed the context completely. For it puts the portion of "men," who have death and judgment before them, in the strongest possible comparison with those who have Christ once for all offered to bear the sins of many.
That contrast even touches dying itself. Death is not what the Christian waits for:
1 Corinthians 15:51 clearly reveals that "we shall not all sleep," or die. Death and the Lord's coming are in no sense the same thing… No! I look not for death, but for Christ, and Christ is not death, but life — our life. Can a contrast be more definite?
- Appointed. Dying is not an accident of nature. God appointed it for the whole race "once" because of sin, not as His verdict on any one life.
- After. Judgment stands on the far side of death. So death is not the end of the person; he still must face God.
- Before. Judgment follows death, so you must decide in this life. Scripture offers no second chance afterwards.
- Reversed. Christ met the same two things in the opposite order. He bore judgment on the cross first, then death — taking what sinners deserved.
- Waiting. The verse describes "men" as they are. Those who wait for Christ have death and judgment behind them. They look for Him, not for death.
thus the Christ also, having been once offered to bear the sins of many, shall appear to those that look for him the second time without sin for salvation.
Hebrews 9 ends by placing two appointments side by side: one fixed for every person, and one Christ has already kept for His people. The verse then looks ahead to a second appearing where the question of sin never comes up.
The verse hangs on one small word: "so." It answers the "as" in the sentence before it. The two halves set out two very different futures.
Here you have the two portions. Man's portion is death and judgment. The Christian's portion is Christ, the one offering for sins, who is about to return in glory for their full salvation, not judgment. Christ settled the question of sin so completely at His first coming that no one will ever raise it again.
Christ has already paid what man owes.
Christ has taken on the cross these two consequences of sin, death and judgment. What is the result? The believer is delivered from the common lot of man… the believer knows now that he has death and judgment behind him at the cross, instead of before him.
The verse says Christ bore the sins of many, not of all. Writers treat that wording as deliberate. It marks the difference between what can be preached to everyone and what belongs to those who believe.
The evangelist cannot go and tell every person that Christ died as his substitute. But he can tell him that He died as a propitiation. And when, through grace, the soul believes on the Lord Jesus Christ, he can learn the further calming truth: He died as a substitute and bore all his sins in His own body on the tree.
Propitiation is a sacrifice the evangelist can preach to everyone. Substitution is one Person taking the place of another and carrying his sins.
Older translations read "without sin" and "look for Him" where the ESV has "not to deal with sin" and "eagerly waiting for him." The phrase does not describe Christ's sinless character. It describes what His return is about.
He appears apart from sin. He is not only without sin in His blessed Person — that was true at His first coming as well — but, for those who look for Him, He appears outside all question of sin, for their final deliverance.
Why can He never reopen the subject? Because reopening it would have only one outcome.
Why does He not raise the question of sin at His second coming? Because He settled it at His first. To raise this question again would mean certain doom for us, for Christ will suffer and die no more.
Some read the phrase as a filter, as though only watchful Christians qualify. Commentators reject that reading.
The words "look for Him" do not carry the meaning so often read into them — the idea that only watchful believers will find salvation when the Lord comes again. The force of the whole passage is this: sin has been so perfectly put away, and believers so perfectly cleared in conscience and from all liability to judgment, that they are left waiting for their High Priest to come out of the heavenly sanctuary.
Looking is not the entrance fee. It is what a cleared conscience does.
Salvation here is not forgiveness — that is already settled. It is the final step.
Judgment is past. So His coming will be "unto salvation" — full salvation for the body as well, the believer delivered entirely from the very presence of sin… This is the first part of the second coming. Here He appears only to believers. Later "every eye will see him," when He must deal out judgment to those who have refused His mercy.
Israel's worship gives the picture behind this waiting.
Until the high priest came out, Israel could not know that God had accepted the sacrifice. They waited as a people who could not draw near to God in any way until the sacrifice was accepted. But for us who believe, the Holy Spirit has come out while He is still hidden within. So we know His work is accepted, and that He sits at the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens.
For the Jewish readers of this letter, the idea itself was new.
A second appearing of the Messiah was a thought foreign to Judaism. Christians look for that second appearing — an important and comforting part of their faith… and the Christian can look with hope for that return, since he knows that atonement settled the question of his guilt.
- Once — one offering covered both things appointed to man: death and judgment.
- Many — the wording is exact. The evangelist can preach propitiation to everyone, but Christ bore the sins of those who believe.
- Apart from sin — the second appearing does not reopen the sin question. Christ closed it at the first, and reopening it would mean ruin.
- Looking — every believer waits for Him; it is not a badge earned by a watchful few.
- Salvation — the High Priest steps out of the sanctuary at last, and what remains is not pardon but full deliverance, body and all.