The Blood of Jesus

 

 

For you know that God paid a ransom to save you from the empty life you inherited from your ancestors. And it was not paid with mere gold or silver, which lose their value. It was the precious blood of Christ, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God.                 I Peter 1:18-19 NLT

It was only 400 years ago that the English physician William Harvey “discovered” the circulation of blood and did extensive research on the subject. But the exalted status the concept of blood enjoys (as a substitute for life itself) is as old as history itself. The first reference in the Old Testament to blood found in Genesis 4:10 where Yahweh rebukes Cain and says “What have you done? Listen! Your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground” might be figurative but is highly illustrative. It is also the first reverential teaching on the subject.

What is impressive and amazing is that there is no trace of the superstitious use of blood in the Old Testament, but wherever blood is mentioned it is purely in connection with cleansing, expiatory, and reverently symbolic applications.  Judaism, the only monotheistic religion of its time, kept the perception of blood and blood-related ceremonies uncontaminated by the practices of parallel religions down the centuries.  In the transition from the Old Testament to the New Testament practice, we see an exaltation of the conception of blood and blood ceremonies. In Abraham's covenant, his own blood had to be shed through circumcision. Later an expiatory animal was to shed blood (Leviticus 5:6) but there must always be a shedding of blood. “Apart from shedding of blood, there is no remission” (Hebrews 9:22).

The exaltation and dignifying of this idea finds its highest development then in the vicarious shedding of blood by Christ Himself. 1John 1:7 says "But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin". At the wedding at Cana Jesus turned water into wine in His first miracle, and established Himself as the Messiah. Wine was the most natural substitute for blood. Jesus took advantage of this, and introduced the beautiful and significant ceremony (Mathew  26:28) of drinking wine and eating bread as symbolic of the primitive inter transfusion of blood and flesh in a pledge of eternal fellowship.  Compare the following verses:                             

Exodus 24:6 Moses drained half the blood from these animals into basins. The other half he splattered against the altar.                                                                      

John 6:53 So Jesus said again, “I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you cannot have eternal life within you”.               

This is the climactic expression of blood rites recorded in the Bible.

The fact that Jesus Christ shed His blood for us means a lot;; 

1. Christ has paid the penalty for our sins in full and we do not have to pay the penalty. Isaiah said, "All we, like sheep, have strayed away. We have left God's paths to follow our own. Yet the LORD laid on Him the sins of us all" (Isaiah 53:6). Isaiah compares a disobedient and rebellious nation of Israel to wandering sheep and predicts God would send a Messiah to restore them back to safety. Centuries later, with hindsight, we identify in Jesus the promised Messiah. But if we know that Jesus died for us, that His vicarious death on the cross and the blood He shed cleansed us of our sins, but still reject Him, our sins will be much greater than our ancestors.

2. We are cleansed from any further sins we may commit after we become Christians. When we commit our life to Christ and identify ourselves with Him, His death becomes ours. He has paid the penalty for our sins and His blood has purified us. The Apostle John said that “if we are living in the light, as God is in the light, the blood of Jesus, his Son, cleanses us from all sin’’. (I John 1:7). The blood not only cleanses us from our past and present sins, but also from any future sins we may commit. Just Christ was resurrected from death, we are also resurrected to a new life of fellowship with Him. We can deliberately choose to treat the desires and temptations of the old nature as if they were dead and decide to live the marvelous new life Jesus offers us

3. We have been ransomed with the blood from the sinful way of life we inherited from our ancestors. Before we believed in Christ, our nature was evil. We disobeyed, rebelled, and ignored God. He “nailed to the cross” the old rebellious nature and replaced it with a new loving nature. We are declared “not guilty” by God, given a clean slate and sin no longer controls us. The Apostle Paul said, “For he has rescued us from the kingdom of darkness and transferred us into the Kingdom of his dear Son who purchased our freedom and forgave our sins”.  (Colossians 1:13-14). The blood of Christ is our ticket into the new life of the Kingdom.

4. We have been strengthened to overcome Satan, the roaring lion who is out looking for unsuspecting prey to swallow, who accuses us constantly before God. Through His blood-soaked death on the cross and His subsequent resurrection, Jesus neutralized the control Satan had over mankind because of his power over death. The Bible says Jesus took away ‘the sting’ of death, having swallowed up death in victory (1Corinth 15:55, 56). The Apostle John says “they have defeated him by the blood of the Lamb and by their testimony" (Revelation 12:11). Since the blood has washed away our sin and guilt, Satan's power has been undermined and his accusations are ignored by God.  

5. Our consciences have been purified by the blood so that we may come before God in worship (Hebrews 9:14) and prayer (Hebrews 10:19). We are no longer alienated from God and we have, as a result, access to Him. The world defines as successful a person who accumulates great wealth, achieves perfect health, holds a respectable position, etc, but true success is in believing in Jesus’ sacrifice for our sins, in our ability to resist temptation, and letting the blood of Jesus purify our consciences.

The most holy place in the temple was shielded from view by a curtain. Only the high priest could enter this revered enclosure, only once a year on the Day of Atonement, and offer sacrifice for the nation’s sins. This curtain tore into two on Jesus’ death, symbolically doing away with the barrier and enabling any believer to access God.    

The precious blood of Jesus Christ has radically transformed the lives of everyone who believes in what He did, and we should be eternally grateful to Him.   By the blood, the curse of the law being satisfied, the purifying Spirit is obtained for the internal cleansing of our natures. The blood which He shed was our ransom, this testifies for Jesus Christ; it sealed up and finished the sacrifices of the Old Testament. The benefits procured by his blood, prove that He is the Saviour of the world.

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