Dctrine f the Crss December 2014 1. The Crss as place f Sacrifice Why des the Crss matter t yu? Recap Gd gives (Gen. 1-2) Man rejects (Gen. 3) Curse, death, wrath (Gen 3) That s hw we are brn bjects f wrath - cursed and heading fr death nt abut sins that we d they are just the symptm ur funtain is pisned at the surce and everything that cmes ut f us is plluted by that deep pisn and s we are cursed and under Gd s wrath Ps. 90:9: all ur days pass away under yur wrath nt nly facing Gd s wrath in the future but we are under it nw same in Rmans wrath f Gd is being revealed (Rm. 1:18) and there is a day f wrath t cme (Rm. 2:5) and that is ur big prblem. Sin is nt ur biggest prblem, Gd s wrath is ur biggest prblem. S the answer is nt just repentance but prpitiatin The big questin is nt will yu turn t Gd but will Gd turn t yu in mercy But right frm the beginning we get hints f the crss: Gen. 3:15 a man will crush the serpent but at a cst physical cst Cl. 2:15 Gen. 3:21 we are nt kay befre Gd anymre we need t be clthed with smething that has been killed Rmans receive Christ s righteusness thrugh Jesus death Gen. 3:24 if we are t get back t the tree f life smene is ging t need t take the blw f the flaming swrd Matt. 27:51 Bld Gen. 4:4, 10; 8:20-21; 9:6 Bld = vilent death Bld shed in murder calls ut t Gd fr vengeance and judgment (Gen. 4:10; Deut. 32:43a) while bld shed in sacrifice r punishment calls ut t Gd fr mercy and prpitiatin (Gen. 4:4; 8:21; Deut. 32:43b; Heb. 12:24). Nthing magic abut bld nt gt sme srt f magical pwer in it if yu drink it r spread it n things just = death. Hw d we think abut Jesus bld? Jehvah-Jireh Gen. 22:14 What exactly des Gd prvide? Gen. 22:13 - sacrifice! A substitute The whle thing is tp dwn Prpitiatin in pagan religins is humans trying t give smething t Gd t appease him. Prpitiatin in the Bible is smething Gd prvides
Passver Ezek. 20:6-10 it s deserved by the Israelites as much if nt mre than the Egyptians Read Exdus 12 What s ging n? What hints f the crss d yu see? epch changing (Ex 12:1); eaten (Ex 12:8-11); judgement upn the gds (Ex 12:12); a sign fr the LORD s peple (Ex 12:13); fr the LORD Himself t see (Ex 12:13); an unblemished male (Ex. 12:5); bldy (Ex 12:13); plague (Ex 12:13) t be memrialized in perpetuity (Ex 12:14); new/fresh nt ld bread (Ex 12:15,18-20,34,39); a sacrifice (Ex 12:27); n wrk (Ex. 12:16); applied with hyssp t the crssbar (Ex 12:22); in darkness (12:29); substitutinary (Ex 12:30); prmised (12:40-41); cmmunity-defining (Ex 12:47); pen t nn-cvenant peple (Ex 12:38,44,48-49); legs nt brken (12:46); liberatin (Ex 12:51) 1 Sacrificial System Exdus 25:40 tp dwn system f frgiveness given by Gd Read and act ut Leviticus 1 What senses are invlved? What s the pint f the laying hand n head? Imagine if yu had t d that every time yu realised that yu had sinned even unintentinally tuched smething hly cnnected with the tabernacle? The stages f sacrifice: 1. Wrshipper brings near / ffers victim 2. Wrshipper lays hand n head f victim 3. Wrshipper kills victim 4. Priest puts the bld n the altar and smetimes ther parts f the tabernacle 5. Priest burns parts r all f victim n the altar 6. Any remaining parts f carcase are eaten r burnt utside the camp Over and ver and ver again fr a thusand years... All intended t teach three simple lessns: Gd is very hly Yu are very sinful Yu need a substitute Smene has t die instead f yu Hebrews 9:22: withut shedding f bld there is n frgiveness But what s the pint f the fire? (stage 5 abve) Read Leviticus 9:22-10:3 What s ging n there? The fire is the fire f Gd s wrath all thrugh the Bible. Either the sacrifice gets burnt up r we d Jesus Jhn 1:29 With all the OT backgrund what d yu think when yu hear lamb? Lk at the build up t this verse Jhn 1:1,14,18,23 1:29 Yahweh has cme int his creatin, Gd has taken n flesh and turned up... as a sacrificial lamb 1 Mdified frm G. Scrivener, The Passver is..., n Christ the Truth.
Read Jhn 19:28-37 Hw is Jesus the Lamb f Gd? What is finished? Hudsn Taylr's cnversin... On a day which I shall never frget, when I was abut fifteen years f age, because my dear mther was absent frm hme, I had a hliday, and in the afternn lked thrugh my father s library t find sme bk with which t while away the unccupied hurs. Nthing attracting me, I turned ver a little basket f pamphlets, and selected frm amng them a gspel tract which lked interesting, saying t myself, There will be a stry at the beginning, and a sermn r mral at the clse: I will take the frmer and leave the latter fr thse wh like it. I sat dwn t read the little bk in an utterly uncncerned state f mind, believing indeed at the time that if there were any salvatin it was nt fr me, and with a distinct intentin t put away the tract as sn as it shuld becme tedius. Well while reading the tract I was struck with the sentence, The finished wrk f Christ. The thught passed thrugh my mind, Why des the authr use this expressin? Why nt say the atning r prpitiatry wrk f Christ? Immediately the wrds It is finished suggested themselves t my mind. What was finished? And I at nce replied, A full and perfect atnement and satisfactin fr sin: the debt was paid by the Substitute; Christ died fr ur sins, and nt fr urs nly, but als fr the sins f the whle wrld. Then came the thught, If the whle wrk was finished and the whle debt paid, what is there left fr me t d? And with this dawned the jyful cnvictin, as light was flashed int my sul by the Hly Spirit, that there was nthing in the wrld t be dne but t fall dwn n ne s knees, and accepting this Savir and His salvatin, t praise Him frevermre. This is the truth that frees yu fr service, fr missin t the ends f the earth It is finished The bk f Hebrews has this as its main theme: Hebrews 1:1-3 Hebrews 9:11-14 Hebrews 9:25-26 Hebrews 10:10-14 Cmplete, nce fr all sacrifice 10:14 What d we mean by cvering things r peple with the bld f Christ? What d we need t d when we sin? If we die befre we d that where d we g? Why shuld Gd let us int heaven tnight? Listen t: Befre the thrne f Gd abve (C. L. Bancrft)
2. The Crss redefines everything 2 Gd Phil. 2:1-11 he is a humble Gd it is the very nature f Gd t cme dwn and die n a crss fr us Lve - 1 Jhn 4:10; Jhn 13 Where is the lve? There: Gd dying fr us n the Crss. Hw d we lve? Like that. Lve is crss-shaped. Glry - Jhn 12:23-24; 13:31; 17:1-4,5,24 Particularly frm Jhn s Gspel we see that true glry is riches, fame, pwer, glden thrnes glry is displayed in what lks t the eyes f natural man least glrius the Crss. The crss f Christ is the event in which the eternal glry f the Sn is displayed. Isn t this amazing? It s nt a tangent. His humiliatin, Him bearing ur sins unt death is the ne pint in histry where human eyes have seen the eternal glry f Gd. And what des that glry lk like? Christ spilling ut his life-bld in rder t save thse that crucified Him. His glry is in giving t thers. (G. Scrivener) Glry is nt s much a smething that Gd gets but the display f wh Gd is - a revelatin f Gd s being as Giver. Glry is nt what lies behind the crss Gd s glry is this self-giving crss. Pwer 1 Cr. 1:25 Yu want pwer evangelism? Preach the Crss Wisdm 1 Cr. 1:25 It lks stupid. Be warned peple will think yu are stupid. But that is the wisdm f Gd and it makes fls f the wise. Faith Jhn 3:14-15 believing in Jesus means fixing yur eyes n the Crss the snake n the ple Gd becme a curse fr us Sin The Crss is the clearest display f the depravity f man given the chance this is what we d t ur maker. And mre than we see that sin is refusing Christ refusing the gift f the verflwing trinity either by hurling abuse at him r just walking away and refusing t fix yur eyes n the saviur Jhn 3:14-15, 18; 16:3. Spiritual warfare The great spiritual battle has already happened. Our great deliverance has already been achieved - at the Crss. Jesus fught fr us. The fight didn t happen behind the Crss in sme heavenly realm it happened n the Crss the satanic nslaught was the taunts f the crwd and their temptatins t Save yurself, Use yur pwer. And Jesus resistance f this nslaught, his triumph ver the devil was his cntinued trust in the Father, cntinued lve, cntinued suffering. And s the devil s triumph became his defeat, he falls int the trap he s laid Clssians 2:15. Leadership/ Lrdship Read Mark 10:42-45: Hw des desire fr status express itself in the wrkplace, in public life, in the church? Why wuld mst peple rather be a ruler than a servant? Are we smetimes sre when smene is mre hnured than us r annyed when ur effrts dn t get recgnised? Why did Jesus cme? Hw much praise did he get? What srt f Gd is this? What must we learn frm Jesus mdel? Life The Crss changes ur whle understanding f what life is abut Jhn 12:24-26 life thrugh death t live is t die, t die is t live this first applies t Jesus and then t us yu get the same thing in 1 Peter: 1 Peter 2:24; 3:18 Christ crucified ur substitute 2 Thrughut this paper but particularly at this pint I am influenced by Glen Scrivener n his blg Christ the Truth (as he mediates the wrk f Martin Luther) and particularly the his 2012 Lent Curse n the Dctrine f Gd fr the Hailsham Churches.
1 Peter 2:18-21 Christ crucified ur example 2 Peter 1:4 that s what it means t participate in the divine nature Suffering glry (Rm. 8:17) The nly way t live is the way f the crss (Mark 8:31-38) What srt f suffering might the Christian life hld in stre fr yu that yu wuld rather avid? Hw des the wrk f Christ and fellwship with Christ empwer yu t face that? 3. The Centrality f the Crss We see this mst clearly in Revelatin 5. Revelatin 4 an amazing visin f Creatr n the thrne but in then, in the next chapter, we have smething even mre glrius. Rev. 5:4 - Why is Jhn weeping? Rev. 5:1-4 the Wrd f Gd is clsed, the prmises are unfulfilled, the treasures chest is lcked up, the tensins are unreslved, the cvenant is ungratified, the glry is veiled... Rev. 5:5-6 - Extrardinary verses. Hears lin triumphing Sees slain Lamb standing The Lin has triumphed/cnquered past tense. What was his triumph? Being a slain lamb. The big triumph, the big battle in Revelatin is nt Armageddn it s the crss that is the central event in histry f the universe that is the heart f the stry that is what all Creatin will sing abut fr eternity The mst unexpected triumph yu culd imagine a slaughtered lamb - nt nrmally a picture f triumph. But it is Rev. 5:9-10 it s pure Exdus the mst bizarre - gt t take a lamb bld ver the dr stay in huse - Gd ges thrugh land striking dwn the first brn sns in every husehld except where he sees the lambs bld passes ver - next mrning there s a dead bdy in every huse either sn r a lamb - Israelites free t g and wrship the Lrd and be a kingdm f priests t him. It s a weird way t free a peple frm slavery. That is what Jesus has dne he is the lamb slain in ur place - nt just Israelites this time but every tribe and language and peple and natin he bre the plagues f Gd we deserve s that n the last day the judgment will pass ver us. That is what is at the centre f the universe. Ntice the expanding circles in Revelatin 4-5 creatures, elders, angels, all creatin all centred n the Lamb Cmpare Rev. 4:8-11 with Rev. 5:11-14. See the greater praise? This is the centre f the universe and if we are t be cnfrmed t reality it must be the centre f ur lives, passin, ministries, ur reading f the Bible, ur preaching.