The Thursday Post: Week 7: Blood in the Two Covenant Systems

When discussing the sacraments, blood is nearly always viewed as being symbolic of life. But there is another view to blood, one that is not often heard in sacramental theology, but which bears just as much importance as the first.
In the Old Covenant system, sacrifice was normal. That meant that blood was common. With that blood came the forgiveness of sins and the redemption of the body (promise of salvation in Abraham's bosom). But it was not a once and for all sacrifice. It had to be done often. Blood meant death. Death occurred often. The death of God's creation for the salvation of his people. The old covenant people were redeemed by death.
Now, in the New Covenant, we have Christ. He died for us, and thus we are still redeemed by death, but the death is different. It is only Christ who died, just one man. A man who was both 100% human and 100% divine, yes, but still one man. In the New Covenant, there's less death, and because of that, there's less blood. The blood that is shed is His blood, and so it is much more special and altogether worth more than the blood of goats and calves.
As the writer to the Hebrew's notes (as well as many others) in chapter nine verse twenty-two, “without shedding of blood there is no remission”. Death had to come upon something to save humanity, lest humanity itself fall prey to death. The Hebrews in the Old Covenant had calves and goats, but “how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?” (Hebrews 9:14) Because Christ is greater than the sacrifices before, he was and is able to completely redeem all who follow Him by His death, rather than by the death of millions, literally millions of His lower creation.