We have been promised resurrection into eternal life, to be with the Lord forever, and to be part of the new Jerusalem, the city that is coming to the earth. We are heirs of all the Glory of God, provided we press forward each day in faith and patience. We are not to fail to serve God diligently by assuming that since we have "accepted Christ" we are eternally forgiven no matter what we do.

Unlike the other high priests, he does not need to offer sacrifices day after day, first for his own sins, and then for the sins of the people. He sacrificed for their sins once for all when he offered himself. (Hebrews 7:27)

We understand, from the above verse, that Christ will not be sacrificed again and again. He was crucified once and for all time, having obtained an eternal redemption for us.

This does not signify that once we receive Him there is no more to be done. Actually, receiving Christ and the Holy Spirit gives us the authority and the power to begin the long, arduous journey toward the rest of God. Small is the gate and difficult the way that leads to eternal life, and few find it. Many start on the way but most do not bring forth fruit to the maturity God desires.

For if there had been nothing wrong with that first covenant, no place would have been sought for another. But God found fault with the people and said: "The time is coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. (Hebrews 8:7,8)

As we study the Book of Hebrews we find the new covenant consists primarily of our moral transformation as God writes His eternal moral law in our mind and heart. Included in the new covenant is the statement that God will remember our sins no longer. However, God remembers our sins no longer, only under the condition that we are cooperating with the Holy Spirit in becoming a new righteous creation. It is not at all true that God forgives our wickedness and remembers our sins no longer even though His law is never engraved in our mind and heart.

The principal work of the Christian salvation is not forgiveness but moral transformation the forming of a new creation as Christ is created in us.

What an area of tremendous confusion this is in Christian thinking!

How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death,  so we may serve the living God! (Hebrews 9:14)

Notice in the above verse that our conscience is not cleansed so we may go to Heaven, but so we may serve God.

Notice also that our conscience is not cleansed from guilt but from acts that lead to death. It is acts of sin that lead to spiritual death (Romans 8:13).

To be continued.