Christ applying His blood as our High Priest

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JTB.SDG

Puritan Board Junior
Christ is our High Priest. In the OT the high priest would enter the holy of holies only on the day of atonement, and he would take the blood of the sacrifice and sprinkle it on the mercy seat (Lev.16). The mercy seat also seems to signify Christ, for the Greek translation, hilastarion, is used in Romans 3:25 to say that God displayed Christ publicly as our "mercy seat." So, Christ is our mercy seat, as well as our high priest. I'm trying to think through the implications of all this as it relates to Jesus, our high priest, entering heaven, the reality of which the holy of holies signified. My question is essentially: Where did Jesus "apply" His blood? In the OT, again, the high priest applied the blood on the mercy seat. When Christ ascended into heaven itself as our high priest (Hebrews 9:23ff), where did He apply the blood on our behalf? Did He apply the blood, as it were, on himself? Or, did He enter into heaven before the Father as our High Priest who is also, at the same time, our sacrificial mercy seat?
 
He is the propitiation, 1Jn.2:2. He has gone into his session, taken his seat, Heb.12:2. The ark is the divine throne.

He is the Temple, Jn2:21. Everything about the Tabernacle/Temple, and its furnishings pointed to him. The ministers also pointed to him, in their persons and in their actions.

The blood the priests sprinkled was tied to his blood, and they sprinkled it upon his seat, as well as upon his altar, the altar of incense, the threshold. They covered the place in his blood symbolically. He brought his own blood within, with his scarred hands and feet he touches everything, he purifies everything. Who once was dead, now alive again, pleads his sacrifice in his resurrected Person. He sits, in life, his blood contained in his body, his wounds visible on his flesh, upon the throne. No more patent "application" is conceivable.
 
OK, I'm likely out of my league here, but does the verb tense help with this question? When Hebrews says: " but through His own blood, He entered the holy place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. (9:12) A plain reading of the English test suggests a completed act, but one with escatological significance. So does the tearing of the temple veil -- not only does it admit us to the holy of holy through the atoning work of Christ, it eliminates the boundaries for the space in which God will meet his people both here on earth and in eternity where there will be no temple "for the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple." Rev. 21:22
 
OK, I'm likely out of my league here, but does the verb tense help with this question? When Hebrews says: " but through His own blood, He entered the holy place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. (9:12) A plain reading of the English test suggests a completed act, but one with escatological significance. So does the tearing of the temple veil -- not only does it admit us to the holy of holy through the atoning work of Christ, it eliminates the boundaries for the space in which God will meet his people both here on earth and in eternity where there will be no temple "for the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple." Rev. 21:22

Keep in mind that, in the New Testament especially, blood = death. So, "through His own blood, He entered the holy place" means "through His own death, He entered the holy place." The New Testament writers use the word "blood" because it harkens back to the Old Testament sacrificial system which, of course, points to Christ. His physical blood has nothing to do with our salvation. It is His death on the cross that means our sins are forgiven and we are saved.

In the past, I've run across some super-literal Christians who believe that, in heaven, there is a vat containing the physical blood Christ shed on the cross, and that we are saved when our sins are dipped into that vat. I kid you not.

How a moral concept (sin) can be physically dipped into a vat of literal blood goes unexplained, of course. But the main question these folks try to avoid is: "If Christ had bled, but not died, would you be saved?" The correct answer, of course, is no. They resist the idea that "He shed His blood" means "He died" because of their misunderstanding of how the term "blood" is used theologically in Scripture.
 
So, Christ is our mercy seat, as well as our high priest. I'm trying to think through the implications of all this as it relates to Jesus, our high priest, entering heaven, the reality of which the holy of holies signified. My question is essentially: Where did Jesus "apply" His blood?
Christ filling both roles as mercy seat and high priest may demonstrate the once-and-for-all nature of his work and its self-sufficiency. Perhaps the mercy seat doesn’t need a fresh coat of atoning blood reapplied because it already resides forever in Christ - the mercy seat.
Hebrews 9:25
Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own,
 
Keep in mind that, in the New Testament especially, blood = death. So, "through His own blood, He entered the holy place" means "through His own death, He entered the holy place." The New Testament writers use the word "blood" because it harkens back to the Old Testament sacrificial system which, of course, points to Christ. His physical blood has nothing to do with our salvation
I differ. The life of the flesh is in the blood (Leviticus 17:11); only when the blood has left the body does it signify death, but in the creature it is life of the body. Now Paul is very specific, he says faith in his blood (Romans 3:25); Paul could have said death, he did not, hence there is something unique about blood, especially the precious blood of Christ. Since all have fallen short of the glory of God, the blood of every man is required of him, the earth will drink it up. The natural man as he lives does suppress the truth in unrighteousness, that his blood will be required of him, and so he must die, and in this life he either ignores this and/or creates his own fig leaves of righteousness to make atonement for his guilty conscience. It is the blood that cleanses us from a guilty conscience (Hebrews 9:14). Yes the blood does signify death, but also life, and the blood which is a product of the body is a medium which flows, literally, unlike death which is a static reality. Now herein is a link between the body, the blood and the soul (mind, conscience etc), such that all men seek the life of the blood, there own and others, yet outside of Christ they do not find precious blood, but guilty blood, blood that has no life in it. Men seek the blood of other men which they believe will save them from death and the fear of death. The works of the flesh, is the guilty conscience seeking the blood of other men to atone their sin; wrath, anger, malice, homosexuality, lewdness; there own blood cries out against them, that God requires it, they suppress such knowledge. Never did Christs heart beat with fear, anxiety, shame or guilt except from our sin placed on him, for his soul was without sin, and so our blood can be replaced with his, the heart of stone with a heart of flesh, our mind with Christs mind. Furthermore, Christ in heaven appears as a lamb slain, he appeared in his resurrection with holes in his hands and his feet, but yet he bleeds not; surely this is significant. Now i understand that i am tending toward the mystical rather than the mundane, but far be it from me to make Christs blood mundane unto irrelevance. We are priests in Christ, and we deal in Christs blood, applying it in every nook and cranny we can, liberally everywhere. It is useful to recognize that we have blood on our hands and on our heads, that we by our sin did extract the blood of Christ, we betrayed him, condemned him, mocked him, scourged him, crucified him and Christ forgives us for doing so, for we did it in ignorance of the truth. We should have been in Christs place, and he punishing us, yet the reverse is so. We cannot drink Christs death, but only his blood that sin may appear unto us as utterly repulsive. We did it, we must own it to gain spiritually by it, to eat every wound and drink all the blood that gushed from Christ! Abels blood cried out from the earth, so much more does Christs blood cry out unto the Father on behalf of the saints, that that innocent blood has been shed for the saints redemption. Does Christs blood remain on the earth or was it resurrected with his body? Does Christ intercede in his humanity without blood, with hole made hands and feet but no blood?
 
On a bit of a side-note, this one was a jaw-dropper for me: "And then there is John 20:12. Mary Magdalene had come to the tomb of Christ only to find it empty. As she stooped down to look in, “She saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet.” Back in Exodus 25, two carved angels took their places at either end of the mercy seat." (https://www.ligonier.org/blog/mercy-seat-connecting-dots/)
 
I differ. The life of the flesh is in the blood (Leviticus 17:11); only when the blood has left the body does it signify death, but in the creature it is life of the body. Now Paul is very specific, he says faith in his blood (Romans 3:25); Paul could have said death, he did not, hence there is something unique about blood, especially the precious blood of Christ. Since all have fallen short of the glory of God, the blood of every man is required of him, the earth will drink it up. The natural man as he lives does suppress the truth in unrighteousness, that his blood will be required of him, and so he must die, and in this life he either ignores this and/or creates his own fig leaves of righteousness to make atonement for his guilty conscience. It is the blood that cleanses us from a guilty conscience (Hebrews 9:14). Yes the blood does signify death, but also life, and the blood which is a product of the body is a medium which flows, literally, unlike death which is a static reality. Now herein is a link between the body, the blood and the soul (mind, conscience etc), such that all men seek the life of the blood, there own and others, yet outside of Christ they do not find precious blood, but guilty blood, blood that has no life in it. Men seek the blood of other men which they believe will save them from death and the fear of death. The works of the flesh, is the guilty conscience seeking the blood of other men to atone their sin; wrath, anger, malice, homosexuality, lewdness; there own blood cries out against them, that God requires it, they suppress such knowledge. Never did Christs heart beat with fear, anxiety, shame or guilt except from our sin placed on him, for his soul was without sin, and so our blood can be replaced with his, the heart of stone with a heart of flesh, our mind with Christs mind. Furthermore, Christ in heaven appears as a lamb slain, he appeared in his resurrection with holes in his hands and his feet, but yet he bleeds not; surely this is significant. Now i understand that i am tending toward the mystical rather than the mundane, but far be it from me to make Christs blood mundane unto irrelevance. We are priests in Christ, and we deal in Christs blood, applying it in every nook and cranny we can, liberally everywhere. It is useful to recognize that we have blood on our hands and on our heads, that we by our sin did extract the blood of Christ, we betrayed him, condemned him, mocked him, scourged him, crucified him and Christ forgives us for doing so, for we did it in ignorance of the truth. We should have been in Christs place, and he punishing us, yet the reverse is so. We cannot drink Christs death, but only his blood that sin may appear unto us as utterly repulsive. We did it, we must own it to gain spiritually by it, to eat every wound and drink all the blood that gushed from Christ! Abels blood cried out from the earth, so much more does Christs blood cry out unto the Father on behalf of the saints, that that innocent blood has been shed for the saints redemption. Does Christs blood remain on the earth or was it resurrected with his body? Does Christ intercede in his humanity without blood, with hole made hands and feet but no blood?

"It is the blood that cleanses us from a guilty conscience." "Blood that cleanses" is a word picture that means the death of Christ. The sentence means that it is Christ's death that cleanses us from a guilty conscience. Yes, you are tending toward the mystical, which is unfortunate.
 
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