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Wherefore when he cometh into the world, etc.

I. THE IMPERFECT SACRIFICES. The imperfection of the legal sacrifices has been exhibited already with considerable fullness. In the preceding verses of this chapter it is pointed out that they were mere shadows of the true Sacrifice; they could not cleanse the offerers, or take away their sins. Another aspect of this imperfection is brought into view in our text. These sacrifices are spoken of as unacceptable to God. "Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not... sacrifices and offerings and whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sins thou wouldest not, neither hadst pleasure therein; the which are offered according to the Law." How are we to understand this? Were not these sacrifices and offerings instituted by him? When the Divine intention in them was realized, and they were offered in the true spirit, they were, undoubtedly, acceptable to him. When the sin offering was the manifestation of the offerer's penitence for sin and desire for forgiveness; when the burnt offering symbolized the self-consecration of the offerer to God, and the meat offering was the spontaneous tribute of a thankful heart to the Giver of all good, then they were well pleasing to God. But when they were offered as though the offering of them were meritorious on the part of the offerers, or as substitutes for personal obedience and service, they were not acceptable unto God. This is the aspect in which they are introduced in our text - the offering of sacrifices as contrasted with the rendering of willing obedience to the will of God. He has explicitly and repeatedly declared in the Scriptures that such sacrifices he will not accept (cf. 1 Samuel 15:22; Psalm 50:8-14; Psalm 51:16-19; Proverbs 21:3; Isaiah 1:11-17; Jeremiah 7:21-23; Hosea 6:6; Micah 6:6-8; Matthew 9:13; Mark 12:33). The principle is applicable still. God will not accept our professions, praises, prayers, or gifts as substitutes for faith, love, obedience, and self-consecration.

II. THE PERFECT SACRIFICE. "Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith," etc. The perfection of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ is here seen in several particulars.

1. It originated with God the Father. "Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body didst thou prepare for me He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second." Not only the sacrifice of the Christ, but his whole mission, was the outworking of the counsel and plan of God. The Savior himself was the great Gift of the heavenly Father to our lost world. All our blessings flow from the throne of God.

2. It expresses the most perfect obedience.

(1) Obedience in the highest spirit. With perfect voluntariness our Lord did the will of God the Father. Freely he entered upon and fulfilled his great redemptive mission. "Then said I, Lo, I am come to do thy will, O God." More forcibly is this aspect of Christ's work expressed in the psalm from which our text is quoted: "I delight to do thy will, O my God; yea, thy Law is within my heart." "Jesus saith, My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work." "I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me." He found deepest and purest joy in doing the holy will of God. His own will, his entire being, was in beautiful and blessed accord with the will of his Father. His obedience was not in word and action only, but in thought, feeling, and volition. In the sight of God the obedience of a moral being is never true except it be voluntary.

(2) Obedience in the fullest extent. Our Lord "fulfilled all righteousness." But did his obedience include suffering and sacrifice? Our text returns a decisive reply. "A body didst thou prepare for me. I am come to do thy will, O God. In which wilt we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all." The will of the Father included the suffering and death of the Son as a sacrifice for the sins of the world. On this point the testimony of the sacred Scriptures is clear and conclusive. "The Son of man came to give his life a Ransom for many" (Matthew 20:28; see also Matthew 26:39, 42; Luke 24:26, 27, 44-47). He was "obedient even unto death, yea, the death of the cross." But even here it was not the intensity of the sufferings which made the sacrifice acceptable unto God, but the piety of the spirit in which they were endured. The sacrifice was perfect because it was offered in the fulfillment of the will of the Father." "It is monstrous to suppose," said Dr. Robert Vaughan, "that the Deity could be pleased with mere suffering. It is the spiritual essence in the atonement that makes it to be what it is to us. It may be accepted as certain, that in the gift of the Son of God we have the brightest manifestation of the love of the Father; and that in the willing humiliation and grief of the Redeemer we have the tenderest revelation of pity towards the evil and unthankful, and at the same time the noblest act of worship ever rendered to the good and the holy. In this sense it is truly by the sorrows, the death, the cross of Christ, that we have salvation. It has been his will to become thus acquainted with grief, and to die - to die the death of the cross - that we might be saved." The perfection of the Savior's sacrifice was in the voluntary and entire surrender of himself to God.

3. It accomplishes its Divine design. "In the which will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all." Ebrard interprets sanctification here as involving "both justification and sanctification." But the use of the perfect participle, "we have been sanctified," "expresses not our subjective sanctification, but our objective reception into true relationship to God, and into the actual fellowship of the members of the people of God as 'the saints' (Hebrews 6:10)" (Lange). By his one great offering of himself our Lord has provided all that man needs for the forgiveness of his sins, for his acceptance with God, and for the purifying and perfecting of his being. Christ's work is finished and perfect. To it nothing can be added; in it no improvement can be made. Man's great business in relation to it is to accept of it, and become perfected (ver. 14) through it. - W.J.

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KJV: Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me:

WEB: Therefore when he comes into the world, he says, "Sacrifice and offering you didn't desire, but you prepared a body for me;