Month: June 2018

Truly, truly I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. (Jn 8:34-6)

We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. (Rm 6:6)

You have freed me, O Lord! Hallelujah! I am free!

Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves, and in doing so, he changed the course of history and improved the plight of millions of people, in his own day and in ours. But Scripture says that Christ has done something that far surpasses what Abraham Lincoln did. It says that Christ has freed the slaves. He has freed them from a bondage whose consequences are far worse than those of a nasty plantation owner. He has freed them from chains that they could never run away from, for these chains are in our own hearts. Scripture states that apart from Christ, we are slaves to sin, but the Son has set us free. Hallelujah! Scripture also tells us how this has happened. Christ has destroyed the bondage of sin through the Cross.

The Cross was a multi-faceted event. Christians say, “Jesus died for our sins,” and sometimes we say it so much that it becomes cliché. Many who say the words never allow the words to sink in. We need to see the glory of redemption. In the sight of God all our sins are gone. Praise be to His name.

But the Cross has done much more than redeem us and wipe away our sins. The Cross has actually changed who we are. It is not just that Jesus died for our sins. It is also that we died with Christ (Rm 6, Gal 2:20; Col 3). Our old self — the self that wants its own way — has been crucified. The heart that was steeped in sin has died, and the chains of sin have been broken. The bondage is gone because in Christ our old self has died. We are now free.

This is a transaction of a different sort. In the Cross, God offers not just a payment for sin and forgiveness. He also changes our very essence, for on the Cross, He destroys our old nature.

This transaction is the foundation for a holy life. When people are in bondage to their sinful selves, they are utterly incapable of living in righteousness. But Paul says that our old self was crucified with Christ and that we are dead to sin. Because this is true, he then concludes that we should not let sin reign in our mortal bodies (Rm 6:1-12). In Colossians, he says that we have died and our lives are now hidden with Christ in God. Therefore, we are to put to death all sorts of sins (Col 3:3-10). In both Romans and Colossians, Paul begins by telling us what God has done and concludes by telling us how we ought to live in light of what God has done. The Cross is the power through which God does this work. Thus, a righteous life is just as much a result of the Cross as forgiveness is. If we lean on the Cross for our forgiveness, we ought also lean on the Cross for power to live a right life.

The Cross is the power of God over sin. It is the ultimate Emancipation Proclamation. It frees us from our old master. We were in bondage to sin, enslaved to our own selfish desires, but the Cross destroys the chains by putting to death the old self. Through the Cross, sin is dead. Through the Cross, God says, “You are free from sin. Now live that way.”

This teaching is generally neglected in the church. People hear of Jesus’ substitutionary death and the pardon that comes with it fifty times more often than they hear of this, yet this is just as much a work of the Cross as that is. This part of the Cross prevents cheap salvation. When Paul teaches this doctrine, his purpose is to combat the idea that people in Christ can live in sin (Rm 6:1). God may forgive us, but that doesn’t mean we can live as we please. Paul is saying, in effect, “If you think you can live in sin, you don’t understand what happened on the Cross.”

It is no coincidence, then, when churches that neglect this teaching often breed shallow faith. “Just come to Jesus and His blood will cover your sins and God will forgive you.” That statement is gloriously true, but it is incomplete. Sometimes our message stops in Romans chapter 3, but Paul’s message doesn’t.   The good news is that in Christ, followers of Jesus are made right in the eyes of God AND made right in their very nature. Forgiveness and reconciliation are built upon the Cross. But so is a holy life. We are to live a certain type of life because, through the Cross, God has made us into a certain type of person.   Our slavery to sin is over. The Son has set us free.

“Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”  This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.  (Eph 5:31-2)

Lord Jesus … I do.

When a rich man marries a poor woman, the two become one.   They share one home, one life, one bed, one estate, and one purpose. As far as the law is concerned, everything the husband has belongs to the wife. His riches are hers. She may have come out of the slums, but now she is a duchess.

The Scriptures make the wild claim that the Christian is that poor woman who became a duchess.

Our original poverty is a result of our spiritual state in sin. Our natural home is a spiritual slum. It is a spiritually oppressive place, an ugly, smelly, dirty place, a hopeless place, though some entertain false hopes of earning their way out of it.   People build their little shanties and make things as pleasant as they can, but they were born in the slums, they live in the slums, and if they insist on their own way, they will die there. We are poor spiritually because we sin. Our sin has separated us from our God and has consequently left us only what we can contrive on our own. Our sin has corrupted our bodies and souls. It has brought sickness and death, bitterness and meaninglessness. In sin we lose our purpose, our peace, and our hope, for in sin we lose God, and all good things are tied up in God.

But God calls us out of these slums and into His riches, and the Christian enjoys abundant spiritual wealth, the result of a wondrous marriage we have entered into — the uniting of our souls to Christ. In Him, we share one life, one Spirit, one inheritance, and one purpose. As far as God is concerned, everything Christ has belongs to us. His riches are ours. We have, thus, moved from the spiritual slums to a spiritual palace. Our new identity takes on the name of our Groom. Our new life is a garden of righteousness. Our new home is filled with peace and joy, and hope reigns over our souls.

We do not have any of these riches because we have somehow earned our way out of the slums. The kingdom of God has no “pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps” stories. We have these riches because we belong to Jesus and Jesus has these riches.

This marriage of my soul to Jesus — this new identity in Jesus — is the substance of what it means to be a Christian. We are married to Christ. We have died to the law that we might belong to him who was raised from the dead (Rm 7: 4). We may talk of all sorts of wonderful benefits that Scripture promises, but this is the source of them all. Everything we enjoy as Christians, we enjoy because of our union with Christ. We are in Him, and being in Him means that we have His riches. We are united with Christ in his death so that we share in his resurrection (Rm 6:5). In Christ we have received every spiritual blessing in heavenly places (Eph 1:3). In Him, we are chosen to be holy and blameless (Eph 1:4). In Him, we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins (Eph 1:7). In Him, we see God’s great and mysterious purpose (Eph 1:9). In Him, we are united together (Eph 1:10). In Him we receive an inheritance unspeakable (Eph 1:11). In Him, we receive God’s Holy Spirit (Eph 1:13). In Him, we do not live under condemnation (Rom 8:1).

The real Gift of God is not forgiveness or peace or love or holiness. The real Gift of God is a union with Christ, or to put it another way, a union with God Himself. All of these other gifts are byproducts. They are certainly glorious, but their glory is itself a reflection of the glory of God. God is the real prize.

God has given us Himself, and He has done so in Jesus Christ. When we marry Jesus, we receive everything that Jesus has. All good gifts are in Christ. “This is the message. God has given us eternal life and that life is in his Son. He who has the Son has life. He who does not have the Son of God does not have life” (I Jn 5:12-13).

Thus, the key to life is not to pursue life. The key to joy is not to pursue joy. The key to holiness is not to pursue holiness. The key to all these things is to pursue Jesus. If we pursue life for ourselves, we miss Jesus, and when we miss Jesus, we miss life. Life is in Jesus. When we have Jesus we have everything. When we miss Jesus we miss out on everything.

Let’s be clear. Christianity is not primarily about forgiveness, love, joy, or righteousness. It is about Jesus. And in Him, God grants us forgiveness, love, joy, and righteousness. In Christ we are rich.

All these things mean that Jesus is the prize. When a man marries a woman, he desires a true response from her. He would be a fool to marry a woman who was only trying to get at his bank account or his villa in Switzerland. When a woman marries a man, the main prize needs to be the man. Those who marry for money or status or fame or whatever are phony. In the same way, Jesus will have nothing to do with people who prize his riches above him. He must be the prize. He desires us to unite with him, not to unite primarily with forgiveness or freedom. Those things are good, but they are just part of the estate. We receive them when we join ourselves to Christ.

This idea that God is willing to unite with us in marriage would be insane if God had not said it Himself. If I had come up with the idea, you would think I was crazy. Indeed, often those who hear of earthly marriages between a wealthy man and a poor woman think the man to be out of his mind. This marriage, however, exceeds those by an infinite degree, for the separation between God and us is light years beyond the separation between two social classes.  Consequently, the riches we enjoy in Christ far exceed the riches of earth, for I would rather have the peace of Christ than all the money in the world.

Jesus lifts us from the spiritual slums and takes us for himself. He comes to us and proposes. He says, “Would you have me as your Lord?” We say “yes” by faith, for when we have genuine faith, we have given to him our pledge and our all.

Christ died for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring us to God (I Pet 3:18).

For our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (II Cor 5:21).

These Scriptures give a picture of the great transaction that lies at the heart of the gospel. Remove the substitutionary atonement of Christ, and there is no gospel. God died for us. The death of Christ paid the penalty for our sins. Now we are free in the eyes of the law.

But not everyone likes this idea. Here are some objections people sometimes raise.

1) This transaction of removing sin through the Cross is not fair. If we are the ones who sinned, then we ought to be the ones who pay. It is not fair to have someone else pay for our sin. After all, we do not allow someone to go to jail in place of the criminal. He must serve his own time.

True enough. But our criminal justice system does take checks. If you violate the law and incur a $500,000 penalty you cannot pay, a wealthy man who loved you could write a $500,000 check and you would be free. Is that fair?

Now if someone put a gun to the wealthy man’s head and said, “Write that check,” that would have been unfair.   But Jesus went to the Cross willingly out of love. No one forced him; He freely laid down his life. And if the wealthy man freely wrote the check out of love, we would not call it unfair either.

But this objection does not see reality either.  You see, if we wish to be strict about it, then I’m afraid we shall not be able to pay for our sin. The price is too great. We are like a two-year-old with a trillion dollar debt. We are, thus, left with this dilemma. We could think ourselves noble and insist we pay what we could never pay. Or we could accept the transaction on our behalf. God has written the check. We are certainly free to say, “No thanks. I’ll pay it myself,” but that would be a bit foolish. Headstrong too. Here is someone lovingly offering to give us a gift and genuinely desiring us to take it, but we turn him down with some high notions that we can do what He did. That is not noble. That is arrogant.

Finally, this objection is built upon the notion of works. We must work our way to God. We must earn what we get. This is why Muslims so often raise this objection, for Islam is based on works. If somehow, however, we were to earn our way to God, then God would actually owe us something. No! A thousand times no! This, too, is arrogance. The gospel of God is based on grace. God gives us what we could never have otherwise. It takes humility to admit this fact and to say, “Thank you.” Sometimes receiving a gift is harder than giving one, especially for prideful people.

2) If God is so great and loving, then why does he need a transaction to forgive? Why all the drama? Why not just forgive and be done with it?

There was once a judge who presided over the court of a small town. He was such a merciful judge that whenever he found a criminal guilty, he simply issued a decree of forgiveness and wiped away the penalty. What do you think of that judge?

The idea that God should just forgive and be done with it asks God to be that judge. It asks God to ignore justice. If God forgives without any payment for sin, God is unjust. In that sense, this objection is naïve.

The real situation of redemption is more like this. There was once a judge who presided over the court of an entire province. Since he was the only judge for the province, he saw every case. One day his teenage son stood before him, accused of stealing. After hearing the case, the judge concluded that his son was guilty. He ordered that his son pay the penalty for his crime — restitution to the offended party up to five times what the son had stolen. The son, of course, had no way to pay the penalty and was facing the prospect of debtor’s prison for a long, long time. That night when the father was home, he filled a bag with gold from his personal treasure, and the next day when he went to court, he paid the court treasurer in full the amount that he had ordered his son to pay.

That is the story of redemption.

The transaction is necessary not only because it is just but also because it shows great love. The Cross demonstrates the love of God far more clearly than a vague “just forgive and be done with it.” In the parable, we see the judge’s love for his son through the transaction. If the judge had merely “forgiven” his son and written off the penalty, we would not view the action as loving. Those who say that God can just forgive and be done with it don’t have much of a god left. Who wants to worship that judge? “God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Rm 5:8).

3) This idea of a sacrifice for sins is ancient and barbaric. Surely we cannot in today’s sophisticated world believe such nonsense.

In response to this objection, I almost don’t know what to say, for this objection doesn’t attempt to make any arguments. It simply assumes that modern ideas are superior to ancient ones. This is what C.S. Lewis called chronological snobbery. This objection avoids any intelligent discussion by lumping an idea into the category of ancient and barbaric. It is a cultural argument. What if someone said that the idea of a certain black man is absurd because it came from a backward African culture?  You would clearly reject the rationale and rightly so.  OK.  This objection does the same thing.   Ancient cultures are not necessarily inferior to modern ones. To say that they are betrays an arrogant prejudice and says more about the person raising the objection that it does about the actual merits of the Atonement.