Jesus' death on the cross, how does it save me?
HOW DOES JESUS' DEATH ON THE CROSS SAVE ME?
The moment we ask that question, we have to address another
one: What is Atonement? If we can't answer this satisfactorily, then Jesus'
death is just an unfortunate incident of 2,000 years ago.
"For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his
Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. And not only
so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now
received the atonement" (Rom 5:10,11,
KJV).
It's clear that atonement means reconciliation here. In fact,
the Greek words used are the same, two in verb form -- 'reconciled' -- and one
in noun form -- 'atonement'. Modern versions use 'reconciliation' in place of
'atonement' here (Rom 5:11), the only place in the KJV New Testament where the
word 'atonement' appears. The apostle Paul helps us with our understanding of
reconciliation:
"All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled [reconnected, reunited] us
to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation [reuniting]; that is, in
Christ God was reconciling [reuniting] the world to himself, not counting their
trespasses against them... We beseech you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled
[reunited] to God" (2Co 5:18-20, RSV).
The Companion Bible does a good job of expressing the thought
here: "We see here, revealed in simple majesty, the sovereign grace of God in
providing by virtue of the precious blood of Christ a means where-by the
rebellious creature can be restored to the favor of the Creator. It is not an
entreaty [by man asking God] to 'forgive and forget' everything on man's side,
but a command [for man] to return to God by means of the new connection, and by
that means alone, ie, the new and Living Way which God Himself provided through
the death of His Son."
Restoration
Originally, the English word 'atonement' simply meant
'reconciliation', and was not a theological word -- it was at-one-ment, a
restoration of friendly relations between any two parties. There was no idea of
reparation, expiation, compensation, or payment. Those ideas were introduced by
the orthodox theory of substitution: 'Christ died in my place, paying the
penalty for my sin so that I don't have to pay for my guilt myself' (!) [But
what happens when someone else has to pay for what I owe? I have no real need to
do anything, my conscience is dulled, and my mind turns away from the issue.
It's not just a matter of words. All sorts of things change!] So the term
atonement acquired a new flavor, but not a Biblical one.
Atonement is basically an Old Testament word, appearing
numerous times in connection with the Levitical sacrifices. The Hebrew is
"kaphar", meaning 'to cover', as is apparent in its first Old Testament
use:
"Make yourself an ark of gopher wood, make rooms in the ark, and cover [kaphar]
it inside and out with pitch" (Gen
6:14).
Figuratively, the word comes to mean cleansing, pardon.
Atonement was necessitated by the seriousness of sin and man's inability to deal
with it:
"If they sin against thee -- for there is no man who does not sin -- and thou
art angry with them..." (1Ki 8:46).
"They have all gone astray, they are all alike corrupt; there is none that does
good, no, not one" (Psa 14:3).
"... since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Rom
3:23).
What can be done? Appeasement won't work. Payoff will not do
it. The solution: Atonement [covering] is secured by sacrifice, the divinely
appointed way:
"For the life of the flesh is in the blood; and I have given it for you upon the
altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that makes atonement
['covers over'], by reason of the life" (Lev
17:11).
Note that atonement is made BY God, not simply TO
Him:
"Truly no man can ransom himself, or give to God the price of his life, for the
ransom of his life is costly, and can never suffice" (Psa
49:7,8).
The sacrifices in the Bible were not to pay for sin, nor were
they substitutes to suffer and die, in the place of the sinner. Instead, they
were a humble recognition that the only condition acceptable to God is purity
and perfection -- that sin is uncleanness -- and that sinful man can be
reconciled to God only by being covered by and washed in the blood of the Lamb.
Those who offer are covered (as was Adam! -- Gen 3:21) by that which is supplied
by God and considered adequate by Him. We do not receive atonement directly; we
receive its result, which is reconciliation, cleansing, forgiveness. As we saw
in 2 Corinthians 5, what God has done in reconciliation He has done in Christ.
The purpose of God is always reconciliation, removing estrangement, restoring
fellowship; His work ever since Eden has been aimed toward restoring what was
lost there.
A Covering
A word should be said about the 'mercy seat' in the
tabernacle. The phrase 'mercy seat' was first used by William Tyndale,
translating a German word used by Martin Luther, which he in turn used to
translate the Septuagint "hilasterion". This Greek word was also a translation
from the Hebrew "kapporeth" (a noun form of "kaphar"), "kapporeth" being the
name for the lid or cover on the Ark of the Covenant -- the place God
established (Exo 25:22) where He was pleased to meet with His people, speak with
them, and command them. The New International Version expresses it
well:
"There, above the cover between the two cherubim that are over the ark of the
Testimony, I will meet with you and give you all my commands for the Israelites"
(Exo 25:22).
[Note: This is the only place where God specifically says He
will meet with His people.]
"...since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, they are justified
[reckoned as righteous] by his grace as a gift, through the redemption which is
in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as an expiation [KJV: 'propitiation'; NIV:
'sacrifice of atonement'; FF Bruce: 'our living mercy seat'; Greek hilasterion =
'covering'] by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's
righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins;
it was to prove at the present time that he himself is righteous and that he
justifies him who has faith in Jesus" (Rom
3:23-26).
It was precisely this wonderful divine forbearance that caused
the repentant David to cry out:
"Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered" (Psa
32:1).
It is the blood of Christ, the perfect sacrifice, that covers
and cleanses us -- not ritually, but practically and gloriously. Jesus lived and
died to become the cleansing medium by which our sins are mercifully covered and
washed away.
Deliverance from death
The greatest problem in the world ever since Eden has been
death. The people of Israel had a graphic demonstration of the
problem:
"From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of
Edom; and the people became impatient on the way. And the people spoke against
God and against Moses, 'Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die, in the
wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this worthless
food.' Then the LORD sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the
people, so that many people of Israel died. And the people came to Moses, and
said, 'We have sinned, for we have spoken against the LORD and against you; pray
to the LORD, that he take away the serpents from us.' So Moses prayed for the
people. And the LORD said to Moses, 'Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole;
and every one who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.' So Moses made a
bronze serpent, and set it on a pole; and if a serpent bit any man, he would
look at the bronze serpent and live" (Num
21:4-9).
What is the point of this strange episode? The people shook
their fists at God. He was the cause of their problems, they declared. The
wonders they had experienced, the manna they ate each day, were forgotten in
their self-pity and disobedience and faithlessness. Only when they were forced
to realize their inadequacies and their dependence upon God did they come to
regret and repent of their actions. They recognized that they could do nothing
for themselves. So they called upon their mediator to intercede for them, to ask
God to restore the relationship that they had broken. God gave them a pictorial
ex-ample of the means of their deliverance in the serpent on the pole -- a
public spectacle displayed before them. And they were given the means to be
healed.
[Note: There was nothing magical in the serpent. The power to
heal resided in their looking in faith and obedience at the representation of
what was killing them.]
It is not often noted that Jesus makes a poignant reference to
this very incident in connection with his own mission:
"And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of man be
lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life" (John 3:14,15).
Just as Israel had to repent of their faithlessness and
disobedience, face squarely the representation of their problem -- sin and death
-- in the public spectacle lifted up before them, and look in faith and
obedience to the God-provided means of their deliverance -- just so, all who
would be reconciled to God must look to Jesus, the representative man.
Look at the cross. Look at what sin does! Sin is impulsive and
cruel. Sin looks away from God and to self. Sin destroys the best that God has
to give. And sin is killing us. God might look on sin and just turn away, or He
might strike out in wrath, but He does neither; He acts in love -- He provides
the means for deliverance, as He did for Israel:
"For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in
him should not perish but have eternal life" (v
16).
In what may be a commentary on his own words in John 3, Jesus
says (John 6:40):
"For this is the will of my Father, that every one who sees the Son and believes
in him should have eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day."
And Paul says:
"While we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly... But
God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for [on
behalf of] us... For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the
death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by
his life" (Rom 5:6,8,10).
Jesus consented to a death normally reserved for those guilty
of desperately evil crimes, to reveal the terrible character of sin.
Any sin is a violation of God's holiness. How can God -- who
is holy, just, and separate from sin -- forgive a sin against His holiness, and
so reckon a sinner as justified (righteous)?
By overlooking it? No, that's not forgiveness.
By having Jesus pay off the debt as our substitute? No, that
is not just, and sins aren't transferable.
The correct answer is given by Paul:
"For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: sending his
own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the
flesh" (Rom 8:3).
FF Bruce puts it: "He passed the death-sentence on sin in the
domain of human flesh." Jesus' flesh was the arena of the perfect and total
victory over sin.
"Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise
partook of the same nature, that through death he might destroy him who has the
power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of
death were subject to lifelong bondage" (Heb
2:14,15).
Now that sin has been defeated on its own ground, the way is
open for God to forgive sinners on the basis of faith and obedience, without
compromising His own holiness.
Summary
Jesus Christ, the bearer of a sin nature like ours, destroyed
sin by a life of perfect obedience, finally being obedient to the cross in
offering himself as a perfect sacrifice. Sinners, repentant and identifying
themselves with Jesus in baptism and a subsequent holy life (like Israel looking
upon the bronze serpent), look to Jesus in faith. On that basis, God meets with
us at the 'mercy seat', the cover of the Ark of the Covenant (Jesus), and
forgives our sins. And thus we are justified (made righteous) by his blood.
(NZ)
