The Hallmark

 Greetings to you all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ,

      But Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building;  Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us.”

     While in Spain, I purchased four Swiss army knives for the equivalent of a couple of dollars each.  They looked authentic but were cheaply made of materials that would not stand up to the task.  I later on purchased  an authentic knife when I got home and I am still using tha same knife.  There are a lot of imitations of many things in the world today.  We sell a lot of greeting cards in America and there is one that has a phrase, “When you care enough to  send the very best.”  The card company is also one of the most expensive on the market.  In the end, “What determines if something is the very best?”

          God set a standard  right from the beginning that anything that was to be offered as a sacrifice had to be perfect, or without blemish..  If you were required to offer a lamb for a sacrifice it could not be one with a bad leg, or spots on it, or sores or even sick.  The lamb had to be perfect.  God did not want anything that was of no use to anyone, put one that was perfect in every way.  There was only one person who ever walked upon the face of the earth tha fit the description of perfection in every way and that was the Lord Jesus Christ , the Son of God.  In John’s gospel we see that Jesus was the One Who was to take away the sin penalty for the world.  The Lord Jesus Christ   was, is and always will be “perfection” in every way and because of that you and I can have salvation.  His righteousness was imputed to us and our sins were imputed to Him.  We can safely says, “God cared so much that He sent the very best.”  John 3:16 reminds us of that very fact.  The Father gave His only begotten Son that we might have life by believing on Him for our salvation.  All of man’s feeble efforts to get to heaven are based on things that are nothing more than a blemish or sickness.  We cannot earn such a precious gift as salvation no matter how many things we try to come up with  because they are all based on that which is imperfect and when you look closely at them, you see that they are trying to produce perfection with something that is so grossly imperfect that it will never get you there.  Every believer is a precious stone in the “Body of Christ”  having been placed there by the Holy Spirit and as a result, will be without spot or blemish.  While my greeting cards will not always be the “very best” the message of the gospel is indeed the very best and perfect in every way.  Praise God for sending the Very Best, His own Son!