You Need the Atoning Blood of Jesus

Blood is just as essential to spiritual life as it is to physical life. The blood of Jesus is atoning blood.

Two months ago I was in the emergency room suffering from what I later learned was a kidney stone. One of the first things the doctor did was order blood work. The phlebotomist wrapped an elastic cord around my arm and stuck a needle in my vein.

I looked away. I always look at the wall on the other side of the room when phlebotomists draw my blood. I don’t like to see that mysterious red liquid being taken from my body. I’ve never gotten lightheaded or fainted at the sight, but it’s disturbing, so I look the other way.

Anyone’s blood is disturbing to look at. War movies with blood splattering everywhere? No thank you.

A few years ago I saw a National Geographic photo of a room where animals were slain for religious sacrifice in India. A puddle of blood covered the floor.

The photo was shocking to me because I have grown up in the West. I have never witnessed animal sacrifice. Educated Americans generally regard it as a mark of primitive religion and superstition. Blood is even used in occult practices.

Atoning blood

Yet, at the center of the Christian gospel is the importance of blood. Not that we shed the blood of animals or humans today. But the gospel speaks of the importance of the blood of the Son of God shed 2,000 years ago on the cross.

One New Testament verse that summarizes the message of the gospel says: “God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith” (Romans 3:25, NIV).

What sophisticated Westerners today regard as primitive is actually a necessary element of how God redeemed sinful mankind. But it’s still disturbing. In fact over the last century, liberal “Christian” denominations expunged blood from hymns and polite preaching. But you cannot remove blood from its prominent place in the Bible without rewriting it.

Why?

Why at the Last Supper did Jesus call attention to his blood when he announced the enactment of a New Covenant with God?

“This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood” (Luke 22:20, ESV).

Why was Jesus willing to offend and lose dozens of disciples with a similar statement at an earlier time?

“Jesus said to them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you” (John 6:53). “After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him” (John 6:66).

Why?

Why did the apostle John call special attention to the blood that flowed from the side of Jesus when pierced by the spear of the Roman soldier?

“So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first, and of the other who had been crucified with him. But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water. He who saw it has borne witness—his testimony is true, and he knows that he is telling the truth—that you also may believe” (John 19:32–35).

Why?

Why does the Christian church today regularly practice the ordinance/sacrament of Communion with the symbolic drinking of the blood of Jesus at the center of the ritual?

“As often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord” (1 Corinthians 11:26–27).

Why?

Why did Jesus need his shed blood to enter the true temple in heaven itself as our high priest?

“When Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation) he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption” (Hebrews 9:11–12).

Why?

Why, when Jesus appears in glory in the sky at his Second Coming, will he be wearing a bloody robe?

“Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse! The one sitting on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war. His eyes are like a flame of fire, and on his head are many diadems, and he has a name written that no one knows but himself. He is clothed in a robe dipped in blood, and the name by which he is called is The Word of God” (Revelation 19:11–13).

Why?

Why do Christians need the blood of Jesus in order to defeat Satan?

“They have conquered him [Satan] by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony” (Revelation 12:11).

Why?

Why is Jesus’ blood necessary for healing?

“He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed” (1 Peter 2:24).

Why?

Why does blood make peace between God and sinners?

God was pleased “through him [Christ] to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross” (Colossians 1:20).

Why?

Why does the eternal covenant that Christians have with God depend on blood?

“May the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant…” (Hebrews 13:20).

Why?

Why is the blood of Jesus one of the three great witnesses given by God himself to mankind?

“This is he who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ; not by the water only but by the water and the blood. And the Spirit is the one who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth. For there are three that testify: the Spirit and the water and the blood; and these three agree. If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater, for this is the testimony of God that he has borne concerning his Son” (1 John 5:6–9).

Why? Why? Why?

Why did Old Testament law forbid eating blood? (Leviticus 17:12)

Why for the original Passover did God tell the Jews in Egypt to smear blood on the door posts and lintels of their homes on the night the death angel would pass through the land? (Exodus 12:7, 22–23)

Why at Mt. Sinai when Moses established the Old Covenant between God and Israel did he fling basins of blood over the gathered people? (Exodus 24:5–8)

Why on the holiest day in Israel’s annual calendar, the Day of Atonement, in the holiest moment of the ritual, did the high priest sprinkle blood seven times on the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies of the tabernacle/temple? (Leviticus 16:14)

Why did Abel’s blood, shed in murder by Cain, cry out to God from the ground? (Genesis 4:10)

Because

Because blood is more than its natural elements, more than proteins, more than white and red blood cells, more than hemoglobin.

Blood is life. “The life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it for you on the altar to make atonement for your souls, for it is the blood that makes atonement by the life” (Leviticus 17:11).

Blood is spiritual.

The blood of Jesus is necessary for the salvation of sinners, for it satisfies the demands of God’s holy justice and transforms his righteous wrath into favor. “Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins” (Hebrews 9:22).

Therefore blood is sacred. It is just as essential to spiritual life as it is to physical life. No medical doctor treats human blood as too primitive for attention or as something to do away with.

Our way and God’s way

Our way: Westerners want salvation without the cross, without messy, disturbing, atoning blood.

God’s way: Blood is important. Blood is central to all life and salvation. It is central to the gospel. If you don’t understand the sacredness of blood in God’s sight, you don’t understand God’s ways with mankind.

Life principle: Put faith in the blood of Jesus. When you wonder whether God will forgive some great sinful failure, when you wonder whether God will heal your disease, when you wonder why God would accept you and welcome you gladly into his heavenly presence, put your hope and confidence in the atoning blood of the Son of God.

Jeremiah 9:23–24: “Thus says the LORD: ‘Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD.’” (ESV)

April 13, 2020July 15, 2021

How to Atone for Your Sins

You cannot atone for your sins. But there is hope.

I learned how to drive in a red Volkswagen Beetle that had a four-speed stick shift. The stick shift was fun. I felt like a race car driver. Decades later I bought a Chevy Cavalier with a stick shift, with which I commuted to work on Chicago expressways. That stick shift was not fun, because in rush-hour, stop-and-go traffic, I would have to push in the clutch pedal and go back and forth between first and second gear dozens and dozens of times. In hot weather, in a car for 45-minutes, without air conditioning, after a taxing day at the office, that stick-shifting felt like more work than I wanted to do.

So here’s something you now know about me: living in Chicago, I won’t buy a car with a stick shift. Not for an incredibly low price (unless I intended to buy the car and immediately sell it at a profit). Not if the car had every comfort and luxury available. A stick shift is a deal breaker.

Atonement

Similarly, there’s something you need to know about God and his ways. This is absolutely who he is, and it will not change. Because he is just and holy, this is the way God works with people: you cannot have a relationship with him without there being an atonement for your sins.

The word atone means to make amends for a wrong. To atone means to satisfy the demands of justice or to repair a wrong. To atone means to fully compensate for doing evil.

On a human level, a person who stole $10, could atone for it to the victim by apologizing and returning the $10 and adding an additional $30 for causing distress.

On a human level, a violent criminal guilty of assault and battery must atone for it by going to prison or paying money for suffering and medical bills. In addition, he must show sincere remorse and offer a humble apology.

Atonement requires death

The atonement that God requires for sin is not as easy and doable as paying money or doing a good deed. It includes nothing less than death.

“The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23).

“The soul who sins shall die” (Ezekiel 18:20).

“Sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned” (Romans 5:12).

God told Adam in the Garden of Eden, “Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die” (Genesis 2:17).

What cannot atone for sin

That God absolutely requires the atonement of your sin means he won’t just forget about sins, as though the passing of time, even thousands or millions of years, would change what he requires. He won’t ignore sins. He won’t forgive them solely out of mercy.

He won’t put your sins on one side of a scale and your good works on the other side of the scale, and then, if your good works outweigh your bad works, forgive your sins. In other words, good deeds can’t atone for bad deeds, just as a life of good deeds can’t atone for murder in the eyes of the criminal justice system.

God won’t accept you because you do thousands of religious duties such as going to church or mass, saying prayers, reading the Scripture, keeping religious holidays, having religious statues and pictures in your car or your home, wearing a religious necklace, or taking religious sacraments. He won’t be your Father or Friend unless there is an atonement for your sins.

But he will gladly forgive sins if there is an atonement—only if there is the atonement he requires.

What can atone for sin

Like it or not, agree with it or not, regard it as primitive if you like, this is how the Bible reveals God from Genesis to Revelation. In the Old Testament, the purpose of animal sacrifices was atonement for sin. Likewise in the New Testament the purpose of the death of Jesus on the cross was atonement for sin.

For example, prescribing how the priests were to make sin offerings of lambs for the Israelites, Moses said, “The priest shall burn it on the altar, on top of the LORD’s food offerings. And the priest shall make atonement for him for the sin which he has committed, and he shall be forgiven” (Leviticus 4:35 ESV).

The Old Testament Book of Leviticus, which tells the priests in great detail how to conduct all the sacrificial offerings of animals, uses the word atonement 51 times.

The only sacrifice that ultimately atones

Likewise the New Testament says:

“Christ died for our sins” (1 Corinthians 15:3).

“Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins” (Hebrews 10:12).

“In him [Christ] we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses” (Ephesians 1:7).

“Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins” (Hebrews 9:22).

Atonement and forgiveness

Notice in the following verse the words atonement, sin, and forgiven: “The priest shall make atonement for him for the sin which he has committed, and he shall be forgiven” (Leviticus 4:35).

Notice in Leviticus 6:7 the words atonement, forgiven, and guilty: “The priest shall make atonement for him before the LORD, and he shall be forgiven for any of the things that one may do and thereby become guilty.”

Sin brings guilt before God, and it must be judged by God. This is important: something about the nature of God’s holiness and justice requires—absolutely and without exception demands—that sin be judged. If you don’t know this, you don’t know God rightly according to the teaching of the Scripture. Sin brings guilt before the God of perfect justice, and guilt makes one liable to punishment by the God of perfect, holy justice.

Our way and God’s way

Our way: We want to make amends for our wrongs by performing religious rituals, going to church, giving money to some good cause, being nice.

God’s way: He accepts one thing—and only one—for the atonement of our wrongs: the death of his Son Jesus on the cross. His death can be, and is if we trust in him, the only substitute for ours. (The sacrifice of animals no longer avails for atonement, for God accepted that method only as a temporary, forward-looking proxy for the atoning death of Jesus. See Hebrews 10:1–14.)

Life principle: Any religion or belief system that makes the atoning death of Jesus on the cross for our sins unnecessary, is anti-Christian and contrary to the Bible. It won’t work. God won’t accept you without the atonement brought about through Jesus Christ and without your sincere faith in that atonement on your behalf and its power to bring the forgiveness of sins. This is why Jesus said, “No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6).

I invite you to read my weekly posts about knowing God and his ways better. —Craig Brian Larson

April 16, 2018March 21, 2018

The All-importance of Jesus

God forgive me

Have you ever wondered, Will God forgive me?

To have acceptance with God, we must always depend not on trying to be good enough for God, but rather on Jesus Christ and his atoning death on the cross.

God forgive me

Recently on a ride-share I asked my driver, “May I ask you a question about your faith?” and he said, “Sure.”

I then asked him a question that I often ask: “If you were suddenly to die and stand before God, and God asked you, ‘Why should I let you into heaven?’ what would you answer?”

His response was to describe to me several of his religious activities. He said he went to mass daily. He showed me a prayer card that he keeps with him always. And he said he tries to treat people well. But he said no one can be good enough for God.

Clearly he was sincere about his religion, but what stood out to me was what he did not say. Although he is Roman Catholic, he never said anything about Jesus Christ. He has faith in God, but when asked what will make him acceptable to God and give him access to heaven, his default answer was not to mention Jesus Christ.

My driver is not alone. In all the times I have asked people that question, I don’t remember a single time that the clear, immediate answer was, “I am trusting in Jesus Christ as my Savior.” Ninety percent of the time, people do not mention him at all (even those who say they believe in him).

That’s a critical problem.

On what basis God accepts us

This is the sixth in a series of articles on the subject of what God requires of those who want to know him and walk in his ways. We need to know something all-important: God does not accept everybody. He does not accept everybody into heaven, and he does not accept everybody into a relationship with him. In fact, on our own merits, God does not accept anybody!

The Bible says, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). That means we fall short of God’s holy, perfect standard.

That’s a critical problem because God does not grade on a curve. He is perfectly holy and just and does not lower his standards or requirements. Just as a dead fly in a bowl of soup spoils the whole bowl, so the presence of any sin in us pollutes us morally and spiritually and makes us unacceptable to him.

His highest requirement is expressed in these two commandments: “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself’” (Mark 12:30–31).

Who has perfectly obeyed either of those commandments for even one day? By nature human beings are simply not capable of that. We have a fallen nature. We are broken. That’s why we are basically selfish and must try so hard to be loving. That’s why relationships are so difficult. It’s why we resist centering our lives in God rather than in ourselves.

If we are to be accepted by God, it won’t be because we are good enough for him. No one comes close. No one can jump a mile high, and no one can meet God’s requirements.

God’s solution

Because God is loving and merciful, he decided to offer a solution to our critical problem. This is why he sent his unique Son to the world to become a man. Because Jesus is God, he was able to live a perfect life and then die a death on the cross for our sins that had divine, infinite capability to satisfy God’s just and holy requirements.

The death of Jesus atones for our failures. The death of Jesus on the cross is the only thing that enables God to forgive us without compromising his justice. He won’t ever compromise his holy justice, but he will in mercy forgive us because of what Jesus has done.

But God still does not forgive everyone or accept everyone.

The requirement of faith in Jesus Christ

The Bible says, “¹⁶ God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. ¹⁷ For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. ¹⁸ Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God” (John 3:16–18).

Notice in this verse the necessity of believing in Jesus Christ.

Returning to my opening story, this is why there is something deeply unsatisfactory about my driver’s answer. Out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. His default confidence was not in Jesus Christ, even though he believed in him.

God’s way and our way

God’s way: We find acceptance with him only through faith in Jesus Christ.

Our way: We rely on our own efforts to be good and religious to make us acceptable to God. We try to accumulate merit in God’s sight. We want some other way than to rely fully on Jesus Christ as our only way to find approval with God.

Next week: More on the crucial role of Jesus Christ for those who want to know God.