The Effect of the cross of Jesus Christ

Transcription

1 The Effect of the cross of Jesus Christ Atonement through Propitiation Morning Worship, Lord s Day 5th April 2009, 9.30am Rev D. Rudi Schwartz 1 Bible Readings Old Testament: Psalm 22:1 18, New Testament: Romans 8:28 39 Hymns/Songs Main Points 1. Approach: Forever settled in the heavens 2. Forgiveness of sins: Rock of ages 3. Thanksgiving: We sing the praise of Him who died 4. Response: No weight of gold or silver 1. Introduction 2. Atonement the love of the Father 3. Atonement the obedience of the Son Jesus Christ 4. Atonement the anger of God laid by 5. Conclusion 1. Introduction Dear brothers and sisters in the Lord, For just one moment imagine yourself this picture: A little lamb is born into your flock. It is the first lamb of the ewe that you can win any show with. It is beautiful and in no time it grows to be like its father and mother. There is no defect in it. The long fleecy wool and the well balanced built of this lamb leaves all the promises of the best you have. You are a Jew and as such you had to attend at least one festival in the Jewish calendar: The Day of Atonement. As you prepare for this day, your heart shrinks at the thought that God wants the best you have on the altar as a sacrifice for your transgressions. Every day you feed this perfect lamb you cannot help but to wonder if God would not be satisfied with another. But you realise that in order for you to have peace with God, you will have to take the lamb you really love and sacrifice it to God. Then, one morning, a few days before the Day of Atonement, you catch your lamb, tie a rope around its neck and, with your family, you begin the journey to Jerusalem. It s a long 1 Feel free to copy, quote or duplicate this document.

2 The effect of the cross of Jesus Christ 2 trek which might take you a few days. You feed your lamb, give it some water along the road, and in the process you have a look in the eyes of this innocent animal. Your heart shrinks as you know the reason why you have this beautiful animal tied to a rope, leading it on your way to the altar: your sins! God demands that a life be given in order to atone for your sins. And you think, This lamb is innocent; it is not even aware of my problem with sin! Then you arrive at the site of sacrifice at the temple in Jerusalem. There is a stench of blood in the air. Smoke goes up from the altar as other people offer their lambs or goats or bulls for their sins. The priest looks you in the eye and asks of you something that could easily break your heart. Take your knife and kill your animal. You look at your beloved lamb. Innocent, without defect, totally oblivious of what is going on around it. You remember those big eyes. Your hand reach into your pocket. Only you can do it, because the law demands that you do it: you have to kill the animal; after that the priest will take some of the blood and sprinkle it on the altar. Some portions of it will be offered up in total, while other parts will be given to you and your family to enjoy as a reminder that God has forgiven your transgressions. After the festival you and your family will leave Jerusalem homewards. And in your mind will be burning the fact that an innocent animal had to do for your sins. It was not the first time you had to do this; there were many times in the past, and there will be many more in the future, because the blood of bulls, lambs or goats cannot satisfactorily atone for any man s sin, even if you decide to make an end to this shedding of blood by trying to live a holy and sinless life. It would not help, because whatever you do will never be enough to stop it. Your heart cries out before the Lord: Why!? Why the spilling of innocent blood? Why the anger of God upon sin? Is there a way this can be stopped? Thousands of bulls and goats and lambs are killed every year and it seems as if the righteousness of God can never be satisfied. And only the best you can give will ever be good enough before God, and even then He will not be satisfied completely. 2. Atonement the love of the Father What I have tried to tell you in the story above is but a fraction of the Gospel, but it is nonetheless the heart of the Gospel: We need atonement before God; only a life can make atonement; only the best will do to satisfy the righteousness of God and his anger upon sin; the blood of bulls and goats cannot satisfy the righteousness of God and his anger upon sin; the innocent has to die for the guilty; God alone can make an end to the endless need for sacrifice. We know the verse so well, and we actually made it one of the most quoted and loved verses in the Bible: For God so loved the world that He gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16) The verse we read today in Romans 8 states it very clearly:

3 The effect of the cross of Jesus Christ 3 There are some other verses in the Scriptures to consider: God presented Him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance He had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished He did it to demonstrate his justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus. (Rom 3:21 26) You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God s wrath through him! (Romans 5:6 9) John puts it this way: This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. (1 John 4:10) In all of these verses, and they are surely not all verses in the Scriptures dealing with this immense truth, we find a golden thread: Love, justice, sins, transgressions, action taken, atonement procured, righteousness met and sins forgiven. We see the righteous God who in justice is angry because of sin. There is a loving God, who desires to save. There are us who cannot make amends for our sins. Between us and God is this huge gaping canyon which we cannot cross. From our point of view there is no way out, unless we can find a perfect sacrifice for our sins, a person like us, yet innocent like the lamb: We need someone who would perfectly identify with us, but also perfectly identify with God to satisfy both the righteousness of God and the sinfulness of man. The question now is, Who? 3. Atonement the obedience of the Son, Jesus Christ The answer to those who know the Bible and know the message of the Bible is fairly straightforward: that Person in Jesus Christ. But it precisely here where we can misunderstand the Gospel! So let s go back to these verses once again. For God so loved the world that He gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16) To understand this and others correctly we must see who is taking the action: God, the Father. Listen to this verse again: God presented Him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. (Romans 3:21) But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.... but that He loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins

4 The effect of the cross of Jesus Christ 4 We don t have a sinful man with his goat on a rope leading it to be slaughtered in his place. We have the righteous, holy God who in love looked down on pitiful, helpless, eternally lost rebels, deciding to do something about their miserable state. The eternal covenant between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit to save sinful rebellious mankind is put into action. This is necessary because God s righteousness demands it: sin has to be atoned for, and the only way to do it is that a sacrifice holy and perfect enough to atone, or propitiate, and thus turn God s anger from sin away had to be brought. We might understand that Jesus, the Son of God s love, begged of the unwilling Father to go and procure this atonement. We might also understand from this that God demanded of an unwilling Christ to go and atone for mankind. If we understand it this way, we see three characters in this drama: God, man and Christ in the middle. But this is not the language of the Bible: the first and final action taken was in the Godhead Himself. It was God the Father, who loved man and gave his Son. It was therefore God in essence who became man and provided atonement. God Himself who showed his love by his Son came to stand in our place to satisfy Himself and his righteousness. This is the amazing aspect of God s love: He does not love us because of Christ and the cross He loved us and therefore provided for us the cross and His son. The cross of the Son was a sign of his love; the cross was the necessary way to provide the atonement we needed to know how deep the love of God really is. This is what we celebrate at the Communion Table: the signs of God s love! Listen to other verses. On Pentecost Peter preached and declared God s plan for redemption: This man was handed over to you by God s set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put Him to death by nailing Him to the cross. (Acts 2:23) The passive was handed over to you tells us about God s action of giving his Son. At the beginning of his ministry Jesus received authority from the Father: All things have been committed to me (handed over) by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. (Matthew 11:27) But this authority is also given to Him by the Father: The reason my Father loves Me is that I lay down my life only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father. (John 10:17 18) For this reason He prepared his disciples: The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into the hands of men. They will kill him, and after three days He will rise. (Mark 9:31) For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many. (Mk 10:45) Our text in Romans then clearly concludes about those whom God loves: And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that He might be the firstborn among many

5 The effect of the cross of Jesus Christ 5 brothers. And those He predestined, He also called; those He called, He also justified; those He justified, He also glorified. (Romans 8:28 30) 4. Atonement the anger of God laid by So what is the net effect of the atoning death of Christ? If in the Greek you use the word spare, you would prevent disaster or trouble from happening to someone. To not spare is to actively bring disaster upon someone or something in the form of punishment. Listen to this verse: For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell, putting them into gloomy dungeons to be held for judgment; if He did not spare the ancient world when He brought the flood on its ungodly people, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others... if this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue godly men from trials and to hold the unrighteous for the day of judgment, while continuing their punishment. (2 Peter 2:4 9) So when God did not spare his Son, and handed Him over, He deliberately put Him in the place of those whom God wanted to spare the disaster of punishment. And when the Bible then declares that He handed over his Son, the One He loved, He handed him over for judgment. This word is used in a judicial way to describe what happens with those finding themselves on the wrong side of the law. Jesus declared: The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into the hands of men. They will kill him, and after three days he will rise. (Mark 9:31) Paul writes: He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification. (Romans 4:23 25) Propitiation is what Jesus did for us, or in our stead. Propitiation is to make peace, to pacify, act as one making peace. Now God gives graciously (Romans 8:32). What does He give? 5. Conclusion The most common meaning peculiar to the NT is to pardon, to graciously remit a person s sin. it means simply to pardon or remit a penalty; to release a person from the obligation of repaying what is owed; to cancel debt, to grant freely. When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; He took it away, nailing it to the cross. (Colossians 2:13 14) Because of this God graciously gives justification and glorification based on his eternal predestination and foreknowledge: He conformed us to the likeness of his Son. Therefore we may sing out in praise to God that we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to his purpose. Paul says: For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:37 39)