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The Work of the Cross

Atonement - at/one/ment

[exchange]

Every sinner is both responsible and accountable before God for their sin. All are guilty. All are condemned to die; as God in righteous judgment, has decreed.  A condemned man cannot die in the place of another condemned man so that the other sinner may go free. Each must suffer the divine penalty for their own sin. Only a sinless man could ever take the place of another and die as the penalty for their sin, that the guilty might go free. But all from Adam have sinned. And all are selfish. Who could qualify to save the sinner? And if there ever was a sinless one who could die as an acceptable substitute before God; why would they die, bearing the eternal punishment due the sin of others?

Only God, who is Holy, could.

Only God, who is Love, would. And did!            

Mat 1:23 Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.

Joh 1:29 The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.

For it is the blood that maketh atonement…

There are two major themes of  the Atonement of Christ on behalf of the human race. They are the identification of Jesus Christ with fallen mankind, and the substitution of Jesus Christ for fallen mankind. In order to take our place and  die our death, He must be one of us, yet; without sin. He was. He did.

2Co 5:21 For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

The Identification of Christ with us.

 Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary in fulfillment of the Edenic prophecy: “ And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed….” Though Joseph was entrusted with raising up Jesus as his child, God was His Father. Mary was impregnated  by the Holy Spirit with the Holy Seed: Christ the Living Word. Though Mary clothed the Word with human flesh, the blood formed in the  developing Christ-child in the womb, was from the seed of the Father.

The body of Jesus Christ was fully human; as concerning His flesh. It was no different than the flesh of any man or woman ever descended from Adam and Eve. And yet the Blood flowing within the veins of His body, was and ever is, the very Blood of God!

Lev 17:11 For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul.

The Substitution of Christ for us.

Identified as one of us, Jesus; as both the Son of God and the Son of Man, presented Himself  before God in the Garden of Gethsemane as our sacrificial Substitute. Accepted as the only perfect Substitute by the Everlasting Father and Eternal Judge, Jesus drank to the dregs the cup of humanity’s iniquity; becoming identified with our sin,  judgment, and punishment. All that we might go free.

Mat 26:42 He went away again the second time, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if this cup may not pass away from me, except I drink it, thy will be done.

1Jn 4:10 Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

Christ Jesus; our precious Substitute was slain upon the cross, and then bore our sin and all of its results into the solitary depths of Hell, where He endured the unspeakable terrors of God’s wrath due us. For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son; the spotless Lamb of God, as our substitutionary sacrifice for the atonement of our sins. His Blood was shed, and the hand of God was heavy upon Him as “He hath made Him to be sin for us, Who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.”

It is the Atonement of Jesus Christ on behalf of fallen humanity that is both the cornerstone and the capstone of true Christianity. All that is valid and pertinent in a Christian’s life is the direct result of the identification of Jesus Christ with us, and the substitution of Jesus Christ for us. All through the divinely ordained exchange of the “work of the cross”.

When Jesus became one with our sin by becoming our sin, He did so as the Lamb of God, knowing that He would then bare the fruit of human sin in His being; followed by the crucifixion , His death, and the wrath of God poured out upon Him in Hell for three days. All that we might be His!

The eternally glorious truth of the work of Jesus Christ through the Cross, is simply this: Jesus took our place that we might have His. This is the exchange of the Atonement of Jesus Christ.

Isa 53:3 He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

:4 Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

:5 But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.

:6 All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.

:7 He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.

These Scriptures, as do many other, speak of the identification and substitution of Jesus Christ concerning our sin, its fruit, judgment and punishment.

Jesus identified Himself with us and became our Holy Substitute on the cross of Calvary. He was made to be our sin; gave His life to bear it’s consequences on our behalf. He subjected His holy nature to the law of sin and death; being made a curse for us, that we might be redeemed from the curse of the law. Jesus became our sin that we might be made righteous in Him. He bore our sicknesses; gave His back to the smiters, that by His stripes we might be healed. His body was broken, that ours’ might be made whole. He became poor with our poverty; that we might be made rich. He was alienated and rejected by His Father; that we might be accepted in the Beloved. He was in anguish of heart and soul that we might have peace of heart and mind.

Gal 3:13 Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree:

:14 That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.