the Week of Proper 28 / Ordinary 33
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Contemporary English Version
Hebrews 8
A Better Promise
1 What I mean is that we have a high priest who sits at the right side[a] of God's great throne in heaven. 2 He also serves as the priest in the most holy place[b] inside the real tent there in heaven. This tent of worship was set up by the Lord, not by humans.
3 Since all priests must offer gifts and sacrifices, Christ also needed to have something to offer. 4 If he were here on earth, he would not be a priest at all, because here the Law appoints other priests to offer sacrifices. 5 But the tent where they serve is just a copy and a shadow of the real one in heaven. Before Moses made the tent, he was told, "Be sure to make it exactly like the pattern you were shown on the mountain!" 6 Now Christ has been appointed to serve as a priest in a much better way, and he has given us much assurance of a better agreement.
7 If the first agreement with God had been all right, there would not have been any need for another one. 8 But the Lord found fault with it and said,
"I tell you the time will come,
when I will make
a new agreement
with the people of Israel
and the people of Judah.
9 It won't be like the agreement
that I made
with their ancestors,
when I took them by the hand
and led them out of Egypt.
They broke their agreement
with me,
and I stopped caring
about them!
10 "But now I tell the people
of Israel
this is my new agreement:
‘The time will come
when I, the Lord,
will write my laws
on their minds and hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be
my people.
11 Not one of them
will have to teach another
to know me, their Lord.'
"All of them will know me,
no matter who they are.
12 I will treat them with kindness,
even though they are wicked.
I will forget their sins."
13 When the Lord talks about a new agreement, he means that the first one is out of date. And anything that is old and useless will soon disappear.
