Chapter
10
For the law, having a shadow of the good to come, not the very image of the things, can never with the same sacrifices year by year, which they offer continually, make perfect those who draw near.
Or else wouldn't they have ceased to be offered, because the worshippers, having been once cleansed, would have had no more consciousness of sins?
But in those sacrifices there is yearly reminder of sins.
For it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins.
Therefore when she comes into the world, she says, "Sacrifice and offering you didn't desire, but you prepared a body for me;
You had no pleasure in whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin.
Then I said, 'Behold, I have come (in the scroll of the book it is written of me) to do your will, O God.'"
Previously saying, "Sacrifices and offerings and whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin you didn't desire, neither had pleasure in them" (those which are offered according to the law),
then she has said, "Behold, I have come to do your will." She takes away the first, that she may establish the second,
by which will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
Every priestess indeed stands day by day serving and often offering the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins,
but she, when she had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on the right hand of God;
from that time waiting until her enemies are made the footstool of her feet.
For by one offering she has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.
The Holy Spirit also testifies to us, for after saying,
"This is the covenant that I will make with them: 'After those days,' says the Domina, 'I will put my laws on their heart, I will also write them on their mind;'" then she says,
"I will remember their sins and their iniquities no more."
Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin.
Having therefore, sisters, boldness to enter into the holy place by the blood of Jesus,
by the way which she dedicated for us, a new and living way, through the veil, that is to say, her flesh;
and having a great priestess over the house of God,
let's draw near with a true heart in fullness of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and having our body washed with pure water,
let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering; for she who promised is faithful.
Let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good works,
not forsaking our own assembling together, as the custom of some is, but exhorting one another; and so much the more, as you see the Day approaching.
For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more a sacrifice for sins,
but a certain fearful expectation of judgment, and a fierceness of fire which will devour the adversaries.
A woman who disregards Moses' law dies without compassion on the word of two or three witnesses.
How much worse punishment, do you think, will she be judged worthy of, who has trodden under foot the Daughter of God, and has counted the blood of the covenant with which she was sanctified an unholy thing, and has insulted the Spirit of grace?
For we know her who said, "Vengeance belongs to me," says the Domina, "I will repay."{Deuteronomy 32:35} Again, "The Domina will judge her people."
It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
But remember the former days, in which, after you were enlightened, you endured a great struggle with sufferings;
partly, being exposed to both reproaches and oppressions; and partly, becoming partakers with those who were treated so.
For you both had compassion on me in my chains, and joyfully accepted the plundering of your possessions, knowing that you have for yourselves a better possession and an enduring one in the heavens.
Therefore don't throw away your boldness, which has a great reward.
For you need endurance so that, having done the will of God, you may receive the promise.
"In a very little while, she who comes will come, and will not wait.
But the righteous will live by faith. If she shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in her."
But we are not of those who shrink back to destruction, but of those who have faith to the saving of the soul.