Editorial- The Sacrifice Of Jesus

The Sacrifice Of Jesus is the most important theme of the Bible. The Old Testament, or “first covenant” points forward to this event from Genesis to Malachi. Here are just a few of the signposts pointing to the Cross.

• The skins which typically covered Adam and Eve’s sin (Gen. 3:21).
• The offering of Isaac, the Son of promise, on Mount Moriah (Gen. 22).
• Joseph being named Zaphenath-Paneah, which means ‘saviour of the world’ (Gen. 41:45).
• The Passover night with the blood of sacrifice sprinkled on doorpost and lintel (Exo. 12:1-11).
• Yom Kippur, the great Jewish Day of Atonement (Lev. 25:9).
• The ritual of the red heifer (Num. 19).
• The prophecy of the suffering servant in Isaiah 53.
• The words of the wise woman of Tekoa to king David: Like water spilled on the ground, which cannot be recovered, so we must die. But God does not take away life: instead, He devises ways so that a banished person may not remain estranged from Him (II Sam. 14:14).
• The sacrifice of Jonah as he is tossed overboard into the fish’s belly, so bringing peace to the raging waters and saving a shipload of heathen sailors from certain death (Jonah 1). 0 Lord, please do not let us die! they cried. We are all in that ship and need a Saviour.

All these and many more powerful images and perceptive prophecies prepared godly men and women in the pre-Christian era for the fullness of time, for the supreme moment when the God of heaven, our Father, would reconcile all peoples to Himself by the sacrifice of His beloved Son.

The New Testament describes the momentous event in detail. The motives of all the actors in the drama are examined. Its purpose is carefully analysed by all the apostolic writers. And then its effects and consequences are proclaimed as the wonderful “gospel” or good news to the entire human race cursed by sin and death. The sacrifice of Jesus Christ offers eternal salvation and everlasting life to those who will respond to its message in humble abasement and sincere obedience. Worldwide preaching by the apostolic brotherhood was solidly based upon, and powered by, the conviction that “the man Jesus Christ gave himself as a ransom for all men” (I Tim. 2:6). Only if we sound forth the same proclamation of divine truth with the same vigour and conviction, making it the core and focus of our own witness in 2003, only then will our witness be apostolic.

Let us identify the main features of this gospel of salvation through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, Son of Man and Son of God.

• The sacrifice of Jesus was an act of unmerited grace by God the Father. By definition grace is unmerited and undeserved. The initiative was God’s. It was an expression of our heavenly Father’s mercy and love. God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us (Rom. 5:8).

When Jesus wanted his disciples to understand the reality of this, he told a story about a landowner who rented his fruitful vineyard to some farmers and went away on a journey. When the time came for the rent to be paid, he sent his servants but they only wounded or killed each in turn. In a combination of love and desperation, the landowner sent his son to them, hoping against hope that they would treat him with respect. As might be expected from what we know of human nature, they “threw him out of the vineyard and killed him” (Matt. 21:39). From a rational human standpoint, God was crazy to send his only Son into that den of wickedness. But Jesus is telling us how amazing and irrational God’s loving grace really is.

• The sacrifice of Jesus was efficacious because he was sinless and unblemished. Jesus Christ, the Righteous One, is the atoning sacrifice for our sins (I John 2:1-2).

Hebrews tells us that Jesus “learned obedience from what he suffered and, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him” (Heb. 5:8-9). If Jesus had been like the terrorist crucified beside him, spitting hate at his executioners, he could not possibly have been our Saviour. But he prayed to God to forgive his torturers, and showed love and compassion on others until his last gasp.

• The sacrifice of Jesus was voluntary, a freewill offering of himself. Himself

took up our infirmities (Matt. 8:17).

When Jesus wanted to emphasise this truth, he told a little story about his own saving work. A battered, dying victim of bandits was lying by the wayside. Priest and Levite, representatives of church and state, religion and education, disdainfully passed him by, and left him to suffer. A merciful Samaritan, shunned as a heretic by the religious establishment and treated as an enemy alien by the state, deliberately, freely, and sacrificially brought the victim healing and saved the man’s life. The sacrifice of Jesus was what the Samaritan did, no more, no less. For you and me.

• The sacrifice of Jesus takes away sin, sanctifies and makes holy. By [God’s] will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all (Heb. 10:10).

The body of Jesus was a living sacrifice, not a limp, dead body hanging on a tree. Recently a friend of ours had terrible problems with his computer.

Viruses and hackers had ruined it inside. He struggled to clean it up, but without success. Finally a real expert took pity on him, studied a big manual, went through a long routine step by step, and showed him how to cure the problem. When he got home, he obeyed the instructions faithfully and now he has a clean, usable computer. That’s what the sacrifice of Jesus is like — a wonderful way to get sin and death out of our system, by the example and power of Jesus’ love.

• The sacrifice of Jesus reconciles men to God, bringing forgiveness and healing to us sinners, abolishing enmity and producing true peace. We rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation (Rom. 5:11).

Bible teaching on the sacrifice of Jesus has been preserved only by the 17th century Brethren in Christ, the Christadelphians, and a small number of other associated groups. Apostate Christendom and especially the mainline churches teach that the death of Christ on the cross reconciled God to men, appeased His wrath or satisfied His justice, and cheated the Devil of his victims. The truth ­that the sacrifice of Christ is effective in reconciling alienated men to a loving, merciful and forgiving God – is far more wonderful and compelling.

• The sacrifice of Jesus is available to all without distinction of race, gender, colour, caste or nation. I, when I am lifted up from the earth [that is, crucified], will draw all men to myself (John 12:32). You [Jesus] were slain, and with your blood you purchased men for God from every tribe and language and people and nation (Rev. 5:9).

Within thirty-five years of Jesus’ ascension to glory, networks of ecclesias believing and teaching the gospel of his sacrificial death and resurrection were established in at least twenty-four national provinces of the Roman Empire, at least five independent nations beyond its boundaries, and with some exploratory preaching activity ongoing in several more. Turning to our own present-day witness, five thousand brothers and sisters have been baptised in the past four years, 1999 to 2002, in 125 nations, speaking more than 60 languages from Albanian to Zulu. And there are now nearly 400 Christadelphians in 18 Muslim nations worldwide. This is the result of preaching the “cross of Christ,” just as Paul did long ago (Gal. 6:14).

• The sacrifice of Jesus inspires and impels men and women to repentance and a total emotional commitment to our Lord and Saviour. God’s kindness leads you towards repentance (Rom. 2:4).

Paul expresses it this way: “Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for him who died for them and was raised up again” (II Cor. 5:14-15). The sacrifice of Christ should be the spearhead of our preaching, as it was in the apostolic age. An angel told the apostle Peter: “Go and tell the people the full message of this new life” (Acts 5:20). And he did so, with spectacular results. He did so with great power at every opportunity: “Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord” (Acts 3:19). We are told the effects of this powerful, focused testimony upon the hearers: “they were cut to the heart” (2:37); “there was great joy in that city” (8:8); “the eunuch went on his way rejoicing” (8:39); “he was filled with joy because he had come to believe in God, he and his whole household” (16:34); “they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true” (17:11). Marvellous!

There is a subtle heresy into which, sadly, some sincere Christadelphians have fallen. This heresy is that we are saved by knowledge, not by repentance. We recall our beloved Bro. Alfred Norris telling us at a Jamaican Bible School how an interviewing brother reported to his waiting ecclesia that a baptismal candidate had “passed his interview with flying colours.” Alfred instantly responded: had the candidate repented with flying colours? A mere knowledge of “God’s purpose with the earth and man upon it,” as the cliché goes, may get us in sight of the new Jerusalem, but it will never get us inside. Conversion in scripture is somewhat different: a heathen Roman jailer was taught the truth overnight by two wounded missionaries and was joyfully baptised before morning light (Acts 16:34). On the other hand, a learned Jew with a thorough knowledge of the Scriptures still needed to attend a home Bible class to be taught the “way of God more adequately” (Acts 18:26). We are sure you can infer the reason for the difference.

The sacrifice of Jesus is not a barren, boring, ‘religious’ thing. It is power. It is explosive, spiritual dynamite, as it has always been since the cry, “It is finished,” rang out from the lips of the Lord on the cross of Calvary. A famous and powerful video entitled “Jesus”, which simply re-enacts his crucifixion and resurrection, has brought literally thousands of atheists, Buddhists, Muslims and Hindus all over the world to appreciate the love of God in Christ, and the wonder of Bible truth.

On one occasion Bro. Devon Walker was leading a Bible seminar. A young lady was there. She thought it was some kind of civic meeting, and was totally unprepared for anything religious. She was so ill at ease that she nearly got up and left. But Devon was taking us through the chapters describing the sacrifice of Jesus. As the story of his sacrificial love unfolded, she said later that it was as if she was glued to her chair. By the end of that week, she had decided that she was going to be baptised and give her life and soul to the Lord Jesus. And she did. This is what the sacrifice of Christ is all about: The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many (Matt. 20:28). Did he give his life for you? How will you thank him?