Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Law #3: The Sacrifice

So picture this, if Law #2 is true (which my bible clearly states it is), then we are all screwed, and the entire human race is on a death march to hell, with no exceptions. Imagine God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit all watching this procession of people with no hope and no chance at any future. A people that were created to have a perfect relationship with Them, but the sin that burdens us keeps us in step to the place where we will earn what we deserve, death. Eternal damnation. It's breaking Their collective hearts, but God in His righteous justice has to punish us for the decisions we willingly make. The price must be paid. The Son turns to the Father and asks what can save His creation, what can redeem the long line of doomed people before Him. The Father shows the Son all of time, the entire scope of the human race, and then points out one place in particular. A point in time and space where there is a great deal of death, pain, suffering, shame, and separation as the sins of many are unfairly heaped upon one who takes these sins upon himself, purifying the givers and condemning himself to a bitter and terrible death instead. It is an ugly scene; dark, bleak, and cursed. God looked at the Son, and whispered, "It won't save them all, but it's the only way." Jesus stared at the abominable sight, understanding what it meant. He closed his eyes, breathed deeply, turned to the Father and said, "Alright, I'll go. Send Me there."

That is the third major point of the gospel message. Jesus came to serve as our substitute. Being fully God and fully man, He was capable of living a perfect life and, while dying, to carry an abnormal amount of sin upon Himself. He died, and took our sins with Him when He did. He separated Himself from his eternal connection with the other two Personalities of the Trinity and bore human sins in order to purify them. With His dying cry of, "It is finished," He sacrificed Himself and opened up heavens doors for anyone to enter in. Now, anyone familiar with the story of Jesus knows that He did not stay dead. He conquered death. The reason is to prove He is God and to show that He had conquered the sin that smote Him, but it works well for the symbolism that teaches us that when we place our trust in Him, we die to this world, and rise in a new life with Christ. A life with God that will never end.

This point is also what sets Christianity apart from every other religion on earth. Religion, by it's definition, is man's attempts to get to God by appeasing Him and following His rules and regulations. Christianity states clearly that man sucks too much to even attempt to get to God, and God, knowing this, gave His Son as a sacrifice to pay the price that we could not pay, thereby saving us from ourselves. Therefore God bridged the gap, not us. The Three-in-One is the only One that can be glorified at all this way. Well, that's pretty much the tale up till now. These last three points I covered are what Christians (who know what they believe) believe, and you may even intellectually agree that what I articulated in these three laws makes sense, however it is not enough just to know these truths, and that leads us to Law #4.

"He was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our sins. The punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His wounds we are healed." (Isaiah 53:5)

"Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by His blood, how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through Him!" (Romans 5:7-9)

"I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me." - Jesus

No comments:

Post a Comment