The Finished Work of Christ
In my opinion, Easter is the best time of the year. It's a time to stop and remember truly what God accomplished by sending Christ to die on the cross and raising him back up again. It is the time to contemplate how God saved us from his dreadful wrath. I mean, this is it. This is the climax of the whole Bible! My professors often say the Christ event is the axis which every other event in salvation history revolves around. So, because of the special time and because I have yet to share anything substantial on what I have learned in school, here are some excerpts on one of my favorite classes of the year, which happened to be on the atonement.
This is all from my Theology of the NT book by Leon Morris:
The first thing to be said about the death of Christ is that it is the supreme revelation of the love of God. The cross is not only the measure of the love of Christ but of God himself. "God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself" (2Cor 5:19).
Paul does not differentiate between the love of God and of Christ. Both are seen in the cross.
At the same time that we recognize the cross to be a work of a loving Father, we must acknowledge that the need for atonement is seen in the wrath of God against sin...wrath is the divine reaction to sin. Atonement is necessary because human beings stand under the wrath and judgment of God. Unless we give real content to the wrath of God, unless we hold that men really deserve to have God visit upon them the painful consequences of their wrongdoing, we empty God's forgiveness of its meaning.
Atonement is the cleansing and forgiveness of sins. We see sacrifices of atonement implemented in the OT sacrificial system. The purpose of this system was completely fulfilled in the death of Christ.
We need to remember that blood is the key to making atonement. In essence, the blood of Christ is the antidote to God's wrath. It is the only basis for forgiveness. (Think how precious his blood is..)
He went into an outline listing reasons for the significance of Christ's death on the cross:
1. It brings propitiation- a turning away from wrath to favor (Rom 3:25, Eph 5:2)
2.Christ's death reconciles us to God- He took the initiative in bringing us back to himself (Col 1:20-22)
3.It is substitutionary- "one died for all, therefore all died..." (2Cor 5:14-15)
-another quote: "If Christ voluntary came under the blight of sin, entered into its deepest gloom, and shared with humanity its awful weight and penalty, it is difficult to resist the conclusion that he not only died for me, but that he died in my stead."
4.It is redemptive- brings us freedom from the slavery of sin. The cross is the price paid for our redemption (Gal 3:13, 1Cor 6:19-20)
5.His death means triumph- over all the evil spiritual powers! just like that, they're defeated.(Col 2:15)
Really, you should read the whole chapter and then go on to read about justification and God declaring us righteous. It's just so neat. Well, there's a snippet for yall. I hope it pushes you forward to a fuller celebration of this miracle of the work of Christ.
"Nothing can for sin atone
Nothing but the blood of Jesus
Naught of good that I have done
Nothing but the blood of Jesus
Oh precious is the flow
That makes us white as snow
No other fount I know
Nothing but the blood of Jesus"
This is all from my Theology of the NT book by Leon Morris:
The first thing to be said about the death of Christ is that it is the supreme revelation of the love of God. The cross is not only the measure of the love of Christ but of God himself. "God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself" (2Cor 5:19).
Paul does not differentiate between the love of God and of Christ. Both are seen in the cross.
At the same time that we recognize the cross to be a work of a loving Father, we must acknowledge that the need for atonement is seen in the wrath of God against sin...wrath is the divine reaction to sin. Atonement is necessary because human beings stand under the wrath and judgment of God. Unless we give real content to the wrath of God, unless we hold that men really deserve to have God visit upon them the painful consequences of their wrongdoing, we empty God's forgiveness of its meaning.
Atonement is the cleansing and forgiveness of sins. We see sacrifices of atonement implemented in the OT sacrificial system. The purpose of this system was completely fulfilled in the death of Christ.
We need to remember that blood is the key to making atonement. In essence, the blood of Christ is the antidote to God's wrath. It is the only basis for forgiveness. (Think how precious his blood is..)
He went into an outline listing reasons for the significance of Christ's death on the cross:
1. It brings propitiation- a turning away from wrath to favor (Rom 3:25, Eph 5:2)
2.Christ's death reconciles us to God- He took the initiative in bringing us back to himself (Col 1:20-22)
3.It is substitutionary- "one died for all, therefore all died..." (2Cor 5:14-15)
-another quote: "If Christ voluntary came under the blight of sin, entered into its deepest gloom, and shared with humanity its awful weight and penalty, it is difficult to resist the conclusion that he not only died for me, but that he died in my stead."
4.It is redemptive- brings us freedom from the slavery of sin. The cross is the price paid for our redemption (Gal 3:13, 1Cor 6:19-20)
5.His death means triumph- over all the evil spiritual powers! just like that, they're defeated.(Col 2:15)
Really, you should read the whole chapter and then go on to read about justification and God declaring us righteous. It's just so neat. Well, there's a snippet for yall. I hope it pushes you forward to a fuller celebration of this miracle of the work of Christ.
"Nothing can for sin atone
Nothing but the blood of Jesus
Naught of good that I have done
Nothing but the blood of Jesus
Oh precious is the flow
That makes us white as snow
No other fount I know
Nothing but the blood of Jesus"
posted by Ashley at
8:06 PM
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