No
"Altars" Under the New Covenant
COPYRIGHT ©2017 -
James M. Frye
All scripture
quotations are taken from the Authorized King James Bible. Any deviations are
not intentional. All underlines, bold and words within brackets are the
author's.
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In the Bible altars had to do with sacrifices.
Exodus 20:24 An altar of earth thou shalt make unto me, and shalt sacrifice
thereon …
Under the Old Covenant they worshiped in
types, shadows, and symbolisms (Col. 2:17; Heb. 8:5; 10:1) which were then
fulfilled in Christ. When it comes to those sacrifices which were offered upon
the altar we read ...
Hebrews 9:26 ... but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put
away sin by the sacrifice of himself.
Jesus fulfilled the symbolism of these
sacrifices by being the lamb of God.
John 1:29 The next day John seeth
Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb
of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.
As the Lamb of God, Jesus is the true
sacrifice to take away people’s sins forever.
Hebrews 10:12 But this man, after he had offered one
sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the
right hand of God;
Hebrews 10:17-18 And their sins and iniquities
will I remember no more. Now where remission of these is, there is no more
offering for sin.
In His death upon the cross, Jesus offered one
sacrifice for sins forever. After that, there is no more offering for sin, so there
is no more altar. The altar as a type and shadow
has been fulfilled by Christ (Matt. 5:17; Heb. 7:27). Therefore, no man has the
right to say that a place in a "church building" is an altar. Only
God can declare such a thing to be true and He has not done so (Deut. 4:2).
Jesus made the New Covenant in His death (Mark
14:24). Search the scriptures for yourself see. You will not find any
place in scripture after this time where any believer ever worshiped at, or
came forward to an altar. No place in scripture ever refers to any location in
any building in which a church met as an altar. Paul didn’t give altar calls.
Peter didn’t give altar calls. No one in the New Testament ever gave an altar
call. Since this practice does not come from Scripture, it is a doctrine and
tradition of men. What did Jesus say about those whose worship was corrupted by
the traditions and doctrines of men?
Mark 7:6 He answered and said unto them, Well
hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from
me.
Mark 7:7 Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the
commandments of men.
Mark 7:8 For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition
of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye
do.
Introducing man-made doctrines and traditions
which have no scriptural authorization corrupt the worship of God and we should
have nothing to do with it. The vast majority of churches in our day are filled
with these sorts of things. This is just one example of the many unbiblical
practices taking place in churches in our day.