In this message we shall cover a number of crucial points related to the blood of the covenant.
Exodus 24:6 says of Moses that “half of the blood he sprinkled on the altar.” According to Hebrews 9:19, Moses “sprinkled both the book itself and all the people.” Why was it necessary for Moses to sprinkle the book? The book of the law was clean, but when it was brought down to the people, it became unclean. We have very little realization of how contaminated and defiled we are, and how contagious is the evil within us. Anything we touch immediately becomes unclean. This was the reason that even the book of the law needed the sprinkling of the blood.
The people were foolish in promising to do whatever the Lord required of them. Moses, however, was not foolish. He did not take heed to the promise made by the children of Israel. Instead, he sprinkled the blood on all those foolish ones. He realized that they needed the cleansing of the blood, and he sprinkled them with the blood. This sprinkling of the blood indicates that one party of the covenanters was sinful and needed forgiveness. It also indicates that God was willing to forgive. Hebrews 8:12 reveals God’s willingness to forgive His people: “For I will be propitious to their unrighteousnesses, and their sins I will by no means remember anymore.”
Hebrews 9:22 says, “Without shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.” Blood was shed in Exodus 24 because of the need for the forgiveness of the people’s sins. The very fact that blood is mentioned indicates that the children of Israel needed forgiveness and that God was ready to forgive them. If God had not been willing to forgive the people, He could have set the sacrifices aside and put the people all to death. But blood was shed as the necessary requirement for the forgiveness of sins.
The blood for forgiveness of sins ushered the sinful party of the covenant, the children of Israel, into better things. We know this by the fact that after God’s people failed to observe the law, He came in to make another covenant with them.
In the new covenant God pledged to make with His people, He promised to give them a new heart. Ezekiel 36:26 says, “A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh.” For God to give the people a new heart means that He would change their nature. At the foot of Mount Sinai the children of Israel spoke foolishly to Moses when they promised to do whatever the Lord commanded. God does not want His people to speak in such a way. His intention is to change their heart.
In Ezekiel 36:26 God also promises to give the people a new spirit. This is to regenerate them and reconstitute them.