Thursday, March 8, 2018
1 Peter 1:18-19 You were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.
THE BLOOD THAT RANSOMS
When was the last time you saw blood? Perhaps a paper-cut? A scraped knee? A hangnail? Blood can make a person very uncomfortable. It's not something that we like to talk about very much. Yet, we speak of blood often in our Christian circles, don't we?
At least once per month we partake of the blood of Christ in the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. Almost every Sunday, the blood of Jesus is mentioned at one time or another. Sometimes in our liturgy we quote 1 John when we say, "If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin" (1 John 1:7). It's an uncomfortable picture of the suffering of our God, our Savior Jesus.
The Old Testament believers were much more accustomed to blood than we are. The sacrifices required by the Old Covenant occurred at the temple in Jerusalem daily. Two lambs were slaughtered every single day-- not to mention all the special feast sacrifices, the trespass sacrifices, the sin offerings, burnt offerings, thanksgiving sacrifices, remembrance sacrifices, and new moon sacrifices. That's a lot of blood. However, the blood of thousands and thousands of bulls, lambs, doves, and other animals was not enough to pay for one sin. How incredible it is then that the blood of one innocent man paid for the sins of the whole world!
Peter said that we were ransomed--paid for, bought back from the futile (sinful) ways inherited from our forefathers. One of the beauties of Scripture is the thousands of different ways that it says, "You are forgiven." And this is one of the best ways! God took this thing--blood--this thing that is so repulsive and uncomfortable, and what did he do with it? He made it precious.
Everybody knows how badly blood can stain clothing. Blood is unclean and unpleasant, but not Jesus' blood, Jesus blood is precious. The Revelation of Jesus to the apostle John spoke of forgiven believers in this way: "These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb" (Revelation 7:14). Our robes are white in the blood of the Lamb!
