SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 1/31/2017
10:55 PM
My Worship Time Focus: PT -1 “The
Means of Reconciliation”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Colossians
1:20b, 22a
Message of the
verses: “having made peace through
the blood of His cross…He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through
death.”
I may have mentioned this before and may not have
mentioned it before, anyway when I was a rather young believer the first Pastor
that I had talked about verse twenty and said that it is the only verse in the
entire Bible that has both peace and blood in it. Now according to John MacArthur “blood speaks
metaphorically of His atonement. It
connects Christ’s death with the Old Testament sacrificial system (cf. 1 Pet.
1:18-19). ‘18 knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like
silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, 19
but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of
Christ.’ It is also a term that graphically
notes violent, blood-shedding death the final sacrificial Lamb would suffer.” Let us look at Hebrews 13:11-12 “11 For the
bodies of those animals whose blood is brought into the holy place by the high
priest as an offering for sin, are burned outside the camp. 12 Therefore Jesus
also, that He might sanctify the people through His own blood, suffered outside
the gate.”
As we compare the death of Jesus with the death of the
Old Testament animal sacrifices we know that the OT sacrifices would bleed to
death, but that is not the case with our Lord as we can see from John 10:17-18,
“17 “For this reason the Father
loves Me, because I lay
down My life so that I may take it again. 18 “No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay
it down on My own initiative. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up
again. This commandment I received from My Father."”
I know that I have told this story in earlier SD’s but it
is worth telling again. The very first
time that we hear Jesus speak through the pages of Scripture comes from the
gospel of Luke and this happens when Jesus is left behind after a Passover
celebration in Jerusalem. Mary and
Joseph though He was with someone else and did not discover He was “lost” from
their family until the caravan they were traveling in was gone from Jerusalem a
couple of days. They hurried back to
Jerusalem and finally found Him in the temple talking to some of the spiritual
leaders of Israel. They were amazed that
someone 12 years old knew so much. His
mother was upset because they looked long and hard for Him. He said to his mom “Didn’t you know that I
would be about My Father’s business. The
last thing that we hear Jesus say is “it is finished.” The business of the Father that He sent Him
to do was finished, which was the reconciliation of those who would believe in
Him for their salvation. The Greek word
for “it is finished” means “paid in full,” and that is exactly what Jesus did
through His death on the cross, pay in full the payment that was required for
sin.
Now in our next SD from this section we will look more at
the blood of Christ.
1/31/2017 11:15 PM
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