Jim R Walkinshaw
1 John 1: 7 (from ‘and the blood’)
Romans 5: 9, 10
Ephesians 2: 12, 13
Hebrews 10: 19, 20 (to ‘veil’)
1 John 5: 6-8
1 Corinthians 11: 24-26
It will be noticed that the scriptures I have read make reference to the blood of Jesus. I felt led in this gospel preaching to draw attention to that; and desire that we might lay hold in our hearts of the blessing that is available on the basis of the blood of Jesus. There are many scriptures that could have been read; so I make no apology for reading more than perhaps is usual. What I have particularly in mind is that we might, first of all, come into the experience and the joy of salvation and to see how that depends upon the blood of Jesus and what it has secured. Then we have the thought of justification, and what peace and stability it brings to the soul; that we might realise as Paul says in the Romans, “having been now justified in the power of his blood”. Having been justified, as the teaching continues, we are reconciled and then brought into the very presence of God Himself. These are very wonderful matters that all rest on what has been secured in the shedding of the precious blood of Jesus.
The first scripture that we have read is very plain, “the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanses us from all sin”. Have you had some experience of that, dear brother, dear sister, in your own soul? Have you had some experience of feeling the need of salvation, of feeling the distance that has come in through sin, of feeling the condemnation that rests upon man because of sin? We can tell you that the answer to that is in the precious blood of Jesus. As the hymn writer says,
Shed for rebels, shed for sinners,
Shed for me.
(Hymn 167)
The main thing, perhaps the first thing, to get established is that the blood of Jesus has satisfied God; it has satisfied God in relation to every claim of His throne, every claim that His righteousness required, and everything that His holiness required. The blood of Jesus satisfies God in respect of that. So you remember another scripture that we might have read in Exodus, “And they shall take of the blood, and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel”, chap 12: 7. On that dark night when judgment came across the whole land of Egypt, God says, “when I see the blood” (v 13) - “when I see the blood, I will pass over you”. What that must have meant to those Israelites at that time, knowing that they had put the blood on the doorposts and on the lintel, and hearing through Moses prophetically the words of God, “when I see the blood, I will pass over you”. What I love about that scripture, if you read it carefully, is that you will see that God says, “And the blood shall be for you ...”. The blood is for you on the doorposts and on the lintel. And then He says, “and when I see the blood, I will pass over you”. That is, you see that God is satisfied. He says “when I see the blood”. If you are sheltering under the precious blood of Jesus, God says,” I will pass over you”; but He also says it is for you, and in the gospel dear friend, dear young friend, we can tell you that the blood of Jesus is available for you. The work that Jesus accomplished upon Calvary’s tree can be the way of your salvation and “the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanses us from all sin”.
A little later on in this epistle, if you read through the next few verses, it speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ. It says, “Jesus Christ the righteous; and he is the propitiation for our sins; but not for ours alone, but also for the whole world”, chap 2: 2. What does propitiation mean? It means that what Jesus has done has satisfied the claims of God to such an extent that God can come out and offer forgiveness to you. If you are prepared to accept the Lord Jesus as your Saviour, you can know the power of what He has accomplished on Calvary’s tree. You can know the power of His precious blood that cleanses us from all sin. It can do that, you see, because the claims of God have been satisfied.
In Romans, we see the blood spoken of as the power for various things. Again I would suggest to the younger ones, and all of us, that we read the verses before and after where we have read. I picked out these verses in an attempt to be brief in getting the point across that is in my mind. You will see how the love of God enters into what has been done. It says, “but God commends his love to us, in that, we being still sinners, Christ has died for us”, v 8. But you see the point is that there is power in what has been secured and that power is for justification. So you may feel your need of a Saviour and we would desire in the gospel that God might bring conviction to hearts as to their lost estate. The apostle says a little later on in this book, “the wages of sin is death” (chap 6: 23), and how evident the truth of that is, as we look at this world in which we are, “the wages of sin is death”; but then he speaks of “the act of favour of God, eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord”. I want to speak to you about the “act of favour of God, eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord”. So what is envisaged in this scripture here is justification. A little earlier on in the epistle the apostle has been speaking about God’s righteousness; he has been speaking about how that is available to us; how God is able to offer that righteously, and he speaks about the mercy seat which God has set forth through faith in His blood. That would be the side that we have been speaking of, that salvation is available through faith in the precious blood of Jesus; but then it speaks here of being “justified in the power of his blood”. It is very difficult to find an example of that in this world’s system of things. If a man comes to court, and is found innocent of the things for which he was charged, then he can leave the court without a stain on his character in relation to that charge. The judge can pronounce him innocent. However, if a man has been found guilty of an offence, then the law has no way in which he can be justified righteously. The hymn writer says,
God could not pass the sinner by,
Justice demands that he should die
(Hymn 357).
You see, the righteousness of God cannot pass by sin. So you might say to me, ‘how then can a sinner be justified?’. The answer comes in this verse which we have read: “having been now justified in the power of his blood”. There is a consequence to that, it says, “we shall be saved by him from wrath”. The preacher is not here exactly to preach the wrath that is to come, although that is a terrible reality for those that refuse the gospel. For those who refuse God’s offer of grace and mercy in the gospel, all that remains is wrath; the wrath that is to come. This is a very sobering thing to consider; but the one that has faith and trust in Jesus can enter into the joy and the peace and the stability of what justification means, in the power of His blood. Now what that means is that when you are a believer what was due to you, the sentence that was due to you and the judgment that was due to you, has been borne. It is not that it has been passed over. It is not, speaking carefully and reverently, that God has just passed it by. It is not as though He has just turned over another leaf in relation to your history and mine and your sins and mine. Men do that. They speak of amnesties, and prisoners are released from jail, and things like that. It is not like that; the judgment and the penalty that was due to you have been borne, have been paid for, have been meted out. The wonder of the gospel is that the One who has borne it all is the One that is your Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ. He has borne the judgment, and the witness to that is that His precious blood has been shed, meaning that death has come in. That blessed One, the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, the One who came from the heights of glory, the One who came into this earth here as a lowly babe, the One who, as the apostle says, “did not esteem it an object of rapine to be on an equality with God; but emptied himself”, (Phil 2: 6) was found here in figure as a man and as here He became “obedient even unto death, and that the death of the cross”, v 8. The way that the Lord Jesus went involved Him taking on the great question of sin and sins, that had brought such offence against the holy claims of the throne of God, and if your faith and your trust is in Him and in His precious blood, you can say with the apostle, “who himself bore our sins in his body on the tree”, 1 Pet 2: 24. You think of what that meant for Him. It speaks of God setting Him “forth a mercy- seat, through faith in his blood”, Rom 3: 25. That meant that Jesus had to come here and He came to die; He came here in obedience to the will and the pleasure of God. He was here entirely sin apart. He was here entirely pleasing to his God and Father. He was here for the good of man, and yet as we were reminded earlier today, He was rejected, He was despised, He was spat upon, He was nailed upon a cross, even though Pilate who was there sitting on the judgment seat brought him out and gave testimony to His being without fault. He says, “I find in him no fault whatever”, John 19: 4. That was what Pilate said to the crowds; yet nevertheless that blessed One was led to the cross, and He was nailed there. He hung there and He was subjected to the ridicule, to the derision, to the despising, the spitting, the buffeting, all that man could heap upon Him. He became, as the apostle said, “obedient even unto death, and that the death of the cross”. You think of that, the worst and cruellest death that man could devise, involving, as we are taught, the question of the curse. He was despised and He was rejected and He hung there - He hung there, the sinless One. He hung there, despised and rejected of men, but what He went through at the hands of men was not sufficient to justify one sin or to justify one sinner. It involved more than that; it involved those three hours of darkness in which that blessed sinless One, “Him who knew not sin”, was “made sin for us”, 2 Cor 5: 21. You think of those three hours of darkness, when darkness came across the whole land from the sixth hour until the ninth hour. In those three hours of darkness, God’s wrath and God’s judgment in relation to sin and sins was poured out upon the head of that sinless One. “Him who knew not sin he has made sin for us”. You think of what it meant for Jesus to go that way. We can only get some small impression of it, the enormity of that mighty transaction that was wrought out in those three hours of darkness, when that blessed One hung there and God’s wrath was poured out upon His head. During those three hours of darkness He says, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”, Matt 27: 46. As made sin there, God turned His face from Him. What a terrible thing, and yet how necessary it was that the judgment of sin should be meted out and that it should be exhausted; and that the holy claims of God’s throne should be met. All was met in that offering, in that supreme offering, when that blessed sinless One was made sin for us. At the end of those three hours of darkness He uttered a loud cry and delivered up His spirit, v 50. The Lord Jesus went into death; not only was the question of sins met to the eternal and entire satisfaction of God, but the man that sinned has been removed in judgment forever from before the eye of God. So in that way, justification is available to you in the power of the blood of Jesus. John says in relation to that, the soldiers came along and they were going to break the legs of the persons that were on the cross. How cruel that was. They broke their legs to hasten their death; but when they came to Jesus it says, “they saw that he was already dead” (John 19: 33), and the soldier pierced his side in hatred. It says, “immediately there came out blood and water”, v 34. John says, “he who saw it bears witness, and his witness is true”, v 35. The witness is there, you see, the precious blood of Jesus that flowed from His dead side. It is through the power of that precious blood we can know justification and we can be saved by Him from wrath. How wonderful the gospel is. Is He your Saviour? Can you put yourself in these things that the preacher is speaking of? Do you know what it is to be justified? That is, that what was due to you has been borne entirely by Another, and you can walk free because the judgment has been born by Jesus. How wonderful that is and because of that the apostle goes on to speak of being “reconciled to God” and he can speak of being “saved in the power of his life”. What wonderful things these are. One does not have the ability nor the time to go into the detail of it, and there are those here that could bring it out better than I can, but just that we might have some impression in our hearts of what has been secured for the believer through the precious blood of Jesus, justified in the power of His blood.
So we find in Hebrews that we can enter into the very presence of God, as it says, “by the blood of Jesus, the new and living way”. How wonderful that is. The sinner can know the joy and the peace of salvation, and he can enter into the stability of being justified, of knowing that every claim has been met. The enemy would seek to disturb souls in relation to that. The enemy would seek to get into hearts of men that have their faith in Jesus, and point to various things and bring in doubts. You -
Can point to the atoning blood
And say, This made my peace with God.
(Hymn 357)
You can know the stability of being justified in the power of His blood, and you can know the joy of what it is to be brought in nearness to God Himself “by the blood of Jesus, the new and living way”. In the old dispensation, as we are often told, there was the holy of holies, which suggested the divine presence, and the priest could only go in there once a year. It was not open to the common people. The priest could go in there once a year and then, as it says, he went in with blood not his own (Heb 9), but the wonder of what is for the believer is that you can enter into the presence of God at any time. That is a mark of the efficacy of what the Lord Jesus has secured, that the way is open now “into the holy of holies by the blood of Jesus, the new and living way”.
And the witness to that is the Holy Spirit. That is why I read in 1 John 5, because “it is the Spirit”, it says here, “that bears witness, for the Spirit is the truth”. He is another wonderful blessing that we can speak to you about in the gospel. If you know what it is to have your sins forgiven through faith in the Saviour, through putting your faith and trust in what He has done and in the shedding of His precious blood, if you know what it is to be justified and point to what He has done as bearing what was due to you, if you know what it is to be brought into the nearness of God, the Holy Spirit is available, given consequent upon the exaltation of Jesus. The Holy Spirit is available to bring the witness to the believer in relation to all these things, not only the witness but the present and current enjoyment of them. Do you know what it is to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit? We were speaking about that earlier and how we might know that we have the gift of the Spirit. It is that you find the things of the Lord Jesus attractive to you. When His precious blood is spoken of, you find something in your heart that is attracted to it; when we speak of justification, when we speak of reconciliation, when we speak of being brought into nearness to God, the Holy Spirit would make these things attractive to us. He would bear witness in the hearts and souls of the believer as to the truth of these precious things. How wonderful the gospel is!
What we are presenting to you are things that are real and living and they are living because they are centred in a risen and living Saviour. We have spoken of Him going into death. We have spoken of Him shedding His precious blood and laying the great basis whereby God can come out in blessing. Indeed, you will remember that the scripture records at that time “the veil of the temple was rent in two” (Matt 27: 51); that is, that God has now come out in blessing to men. But you see more than that, the witness to God’s satisfaction with the work of Jesus is that He has raised Him from among the dead. He has set Him at His right hand in glory, a Prince and a Saviour; and consequent upon His exaltation the Spirit has come to link our hearts with the Lord Jesus where He is above. God has seen to it that that blessed One is being proclaimed throughout this earth as a Saviour. As we have already said, “he is the propitiation for our sins; but not for ours alone, but also for the whole world”. I think that is a very wonderful verse and gives confidence, I believe, to the preacher. Wherever the preaching goes forth throughout this earth and, in God’s goodness, the Name of Jesus will be announced, every one that puts their faith and trust in Him can know the joy and peace of their sins being forgiven, of knowing what it is to be justified, being able to hold their head up as it were and being brought into nearness to God and the witness to it, the power of it being known in the blessed Holy Spirit, the Gift consequent upon the exultation of Jesus on high.
So I just close with this reference in Corinthians because it is a very practical matter in relation to the breaking of bread as we speak of it. I just thought of this in relation to the blood because this is something that the believer in Jesus can do for Him. There is so much that He has done for us. There is a poem that says,
I gave, I gave My life for thee,
what hast thou given for Me?
(Frances R Havergal 1858)
Well, here is a very simple request by the Lord Jesus; He says, “this do in remembrance of me”; and what particularly attracted me to this scripture is that He says, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood”. As we look at the cup on the table on Lord’s day morning we think of what has been secured for us in that, because of the precious blood of Jesus. “This cup is the new covenant”. That is, God’s promises in relation to men in His love are all secured in our Lord Jesus Christ; they are all centred in Him: what blessings there are. We have spoken of some of them: we have spoken of salvation, we have spoken of justification, we have spoken of reconciliation, being reconciled with God, we have spoken of being brought in nearness into the very presence of God. What blessings are open to the believer, and all secured in our Lord Jesus Christ. They are all centred in Him, indeed the One, as the scripture tells us, into whose hands the Father has given everything: “The Father loves the Son, and has given all things to be in his hand”, John 3: 35. Everything, dear friend, dear brother, dear sister, is centred in that blessed One at God’s right hand in glory, One who is soon coming, and in the meantime He has requested that we do this. He says, “this do in remembrance of me. In like manner also the cup after having supped, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood: this do, as often as ye shall drink it, in remembrance of me. For as often as ye shall eat this bread, and drink the cup, ye announce the death of the Lord, until he come”. That is the great moment that we are looking for, when the Lord Jesus comes, when He comes to take all His own to be with Himself; and then that time soon coming when He will come out in display. When, as the scripture says, “every eye shall see him, and they which have pierced him, and all the tribes of the land shall wail because of him”, Rev 1: 7. What a day that will be, when that blessed One who at the moment is rejected and despised in this poor earth, that blessed One will come out and be publicly vindicated, when as the scripture says ,”every knee should bow, of heavenly and earthly and infernal beings, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to God the Father’s glory”, Phil 2: 10.
May each one that hears the gospel tonight own Him as Saviour and Lord, put their faith and trust in Him, come to know Him as Saviour, rely on His precious blood and the untold blessings that can bring; and be prepared to commit themselves in simplicity to Him in the breaking of bread until He come. May these things be the portion and joy of all for His Name’s sake and God’s glory.
West Norwood
18th December 2011