02 Salvation - Jesus’ Blood

Welcome back. In the last session, we looked at the concept of sin. In this session, we're looking at the solution, which is the blood of Jesus. And sin has caused chaos, brokenness, broken relationships, and just so much hurt in our world. And Jesus has come to shed His blood.

And that is the solution. That is the remedy for all the pain and hurt that we might feel in our lives. And so as we go into this session, that is what we will be focusing on. Jesus's blood. In Ephesians 1, it does this:

"In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our sin according to the riches of His grace." (Ephesians 1:7). So God in grace has given us His Son. It's a free gift. Salvation is a free gift. And His blood purchases our forgiveness of our sins.

Redemption Through the Blood of Jesus

So the things that we've done wrong, God comes and He covers that by the blood of Jesus. There is redemption. Now, redemption is a technical term for buying a slave out of a slave market and paying for him, and then he becomes your property.

So when we are slaves, we've got no rights, we've got no will. We have to do what our master tells us. And that's also a great picture of what sin does for us. The Bible says that if we sin, we are actually a slave to that sin.

That thing rules us, we don't rule it. And when Jesus comes, He takes us. He buys us by His blood, He translates us and brings us across in redemption into His family. And then He gives us a new identity. Not just as servants within His house, but He also gives us identities as sons and daughters in the house, as we become more and more obedient and we work with Him in His household to extend His kingdom.

And so the priests in the Old Testament applied the blood in four ways. It was sprinkled for consecration. It was poured for expiation. It was dipped and used to mark for propitiation. And then it was wrung out for dedication. Don't worry about those big words, we're going to describe them as we go along.

Consecration: Made Clean for Usefulness

And so, firstly, it was sprinkled for consecration. And consecration is just the big word that means God makes us clean for usefulness.

And so we see the example in Exodus, where Aaron and the priests were ordained into ministry before the Lord in the temple. And so they sprinkled their clothes in order to consecrate them, to make them holy enough to work in the Holy of Holies and before the Lord.

And so there's a scripture in Timothy that I love. It explains this concept of holiness wonderfully. 2 Timothy 2:20 says this:

"Now in a great house, there are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay, some for honorable use and some for dishonorable use. Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself," I'm going to read that again, "Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, clean, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work."

And so here already we start seeing this concept entering in that Jesus has done this for us, but that we must also do for ourselves in order to be useful within His kingdom. A wonderful illustration that I've had over the years is: how many of you have got toothbrushes?

Well, I hope you all do. How many of you have got these new ones? Okay. I still use the old toothbrush. And if you use an old toothbrush for a long time, what happens to it? The bristles start getting all twisted and then when you brush your teeth you can't really get to the stuff there.

And so my mum used to take that toothbrush and she used to use it to clean the toilet, to get to those hard to reach places. The picture really is this: that if we cleanse ourselves as Christians, then God can use us for honorable use.

Obviously, brushing our teeth is more honorable than brushing a toilet. Who of you would like to be used as a brush in a toilet rather than being used for honorable use? And that is linked to us cleansing ourselves. And obviously we cleanse ourselves with the blood of Jesus.

Jesus' blood brings consecration. But as the Holy Spirit walks with us and makes us aware of areas of sin in our lives, we apply the blood of Jesus through revelation of sinfulness. And then in relationship with Him, we repent, we renounce, or we confess and we get made more and more into the image of Christ.

And we become more and more useful for Him in His kingdom. And so this is something that all Christians need to participate in. Every day we need to walk with the Holy Spirit and He's going to make us more and more like Jesus.

Expiation: Sin Poured Out and Forgiven

And more and more usable in the household of God. The second one is then Expiation, that the blood was poured out. And we see that when the Israelites sinned, they had to bring a guilt or a sin offering. They would take a spotless lamb, which is symbolic of Jesus Christ.

And they would bring him to the priest and he would put his hand on the head of the sacrifice, confessing his sin. And the priest would then cut the throat of the animal, catch the blood in a container, and then pour it out on the side of the altar.

And this is symbolic of our sins being paid for by Jesus Christ. And so God takes our sin—the things that we did wrong, the rules that we break, the things that we should have done that we didn't do—and He put that upon His Son, Jesus Christ.

And He pours it out on the altar of forgiveness. And what happens to the sinners is that our sin that we actually had to pay for, we should have died. Jesus shouldn't have died because Jesus was sinless. Now the penalty of our sin was upon Him.

So what happens in that process is when we accept the expiating blood of Jesus on our hearts by faith is God removes our sin as far as the East is from the West. Now does the East and the West ever touch? No, the East goes that way and the West goes that way.

And there's another scripture in Hebrews. Hebrews 10:17, it says this. And He adds, "Their sins and their iniquities I will remember no more." So God doesn't remember our sins and our iniquities, our twistedness, and our sins that we do. That word remember—do you think that God forgets? No. If you look at that word there, it's a compound word. It's made up out of two Greek words. The first word means to pause, stay in a place. And the second word means to chew. And so if you've been in the country and you've seen how cows react when they go out into the field early in the morning and they rush out from the pen—they go into the field and they eat the grass and they store it in the stomach. Then in the afternoon, they'll find a shady place and they'll ruminate.

Which means they throw up the grass that they ate in the morning and they chew on it. It sounds a little bit disgusting, eh? But the application for us is that God doesn't re-chew our sin. So how many of you have done something that you're not so proud of?

I think all of us have broken rules. And so me personally, when I was smaller, my desire for sweets was greater than the amount of pocket money that I received. And so I used to go to the shop and some sweets I would hide, and then some sweets I would pay for.

And then I would leave the shop without paying for all the sweets that I took. What did that make me? A thief. I stole, so that made me a thief. But when I came to Jesus and I accepted Jesus into my heart, by faith, the blood of Jesus removed my sin as far as the East is from the West. Now when I come into the presence of God, who does He see? You see, there is my son, Morne. Not, there is Morne, the thief. And that's what Jesus has done for us. And so the application is, is that God doesn't see you in the identity of the sin that you've done.

And an important thing for us as Christians to remember, where we have to fight and apply self-discipline, is not to think that we're still living in those old identities. Because God has given us a new identity. And the devil will also love to come and remind you of the things that you did.

Because if you think you're something, then you will act upon it. And you will feel those feelings, and this is an area where God has changed our identity. We've become new creations in Christ Jesus. So our sin has been expiated. And then the third, there was a dipping and a marking with the blood.

Propitiation: The Blood That Turns Away Wrath

A beautiful picture of that is when the Israelites came out of Egypt and at the Passover meal. The lamb was slain and the blood was taken. It was used to mark the doorposts—a sign of a cross. And that night when the angel of death came, the angel of death passed over.

And so propitiation means a sacrifice that turns away wrath. A sacrifice that turns away anger. And God is angry with the sin and the brokenness that has happened to His creation. And Jesus in His sacrifice has come and He has turned away the wrath and the anger of God.

That the punishment that we should have got, Jesus has taken that away from us. And so the application for us as Christians is this, is that God is no longer angry with you. Some of us grew up with a strict father or a strict mother, and we feel like we can't enter into God's presence.

So when we pray, we always feel like there's like a glass ceiling. It might be because you're afraid of God. Now, we should respect God. We should have the fear of the Lord, because the fear of the Lord is the beginning of all wisdom.

But we shouldn't be petrified of Him. Because that punishment, which we should have taken, was put upon Jesus Christ. And now we can enter into His presence, even if we've sinned. The Bible says in Hebrews that in our time of need, that we must approach His throne of mercy.

Condemnation Versus Conviction

When's your time of need? When you've *paraptoma*, when you've had a trespass, an unintentional error. Even if you've had an intentional error, we need to come back into His presence. Don't let guilt and shame and condemnation push you away from the Lord. You know, there's a difference between condemnation and conviction.

Condemnation is what the devil brings on us. And God never condemns us, but God does convict us. You see, God's motivation towards us is now not one of wrath and anger, but one of love. And God disciplines everyone whom He calls a son and a daughter.

Actually, it must give us comfort when we get disciplined by the Lord, because He's treating us like children. His children. And so we're still in His family. But condemnation is not from God. When I feel like when I've made a mistake and that God's blood cannot cover that mistake, then that's condemnation.

So an illustration there would be is if you've got a car and it's worth, say a hundred thousand rand. And you have an accident and the cost to repair that car is a hundred and fifty thousand rand. Then the insurance company will say, we're condemning this car.

It's not worth fixing. They pay out your money and they take your car and they break it down and they squash it and they throw it away. God will never throw you away. He will always make a way for you in Christ Jesus.

The Blood of Jesus and Fellowship With God

Now the fourth way that the blood was used by the priests was, they took turtle doves, and they wrung off their necks and they put the blood on the side of the altar. And that was done for fellowship offerings. So that's symbolic of us being dedicated to fellowship with the Lord and participating with Him in what He's doing in this world.

And in Judges 6:38, we see another example of a wringing out. In this example, it's Gideon with a fleece. And there's a beautiful link there. Gideon was approached by the Lord to deliver Israel from the enemies. And so Gideon asked for a sign to ask whether the Lord will be with him in this endeavor.

The first night he placed the sheepskin on the threshing floor. Then he asked that the dew of the night will fall just on the sheepskin and not on the threshing floor. And so that happened. And then in his doubt, he asked for another sign.

And he asked that the sign would be reversed the next night. That the threshing floor would be wet and the fleece would be dry. And the interpretation that I get from that is God invites each and every one of us that accept Jesus and His salvation to participate with Him in the deliverance of His people.

And the fleece is symbolic of Jesus Christ. And so Jesus came into this world and He received the Spirit without measure. And when Jesus went up to be with the Father, He said that I'm going to give you a Helper. A *parakletos*, someone that will be alongside you.

Someone that will counsel you. Someone that would empower you. Someone that would refresh you. And so Jesus came into the threshing floor of this world, received the Holy Spirit without measure, was taken up to the Father. And then when Jesus was taken away, we received the Holy Spirit.

And so now we work with God in this world to bring each and every one that God wants to be His children into His kingdom. And so that's the dedication. It's as Jesus' blood doesn't just clean us for usefulness. It doesn't just give us a new identity.

It doesn't just take away the anger and the wrath that God had towards us and change the way that we should feel about ourselves in God's kingdom. But it also dedicates us to service in the community of faith, so that we can extend God's kingdom through whatever gifting He has given us.

So that we can take His kingdom out into the world and more and more people can hear about Him and can also be discipled. And so that's what the blood of Jesus does for us. In the next session we are going to look at the authority that God has given to us in order to be more holy or to work with Him in His kingdom.

Shame, Guilt, and Identity in Christ

So we've looked at the blood of Jesus and the blood of Jesus protects us, it makes us useful in God's kingdom, and it deals with this thing of our identity in Christ. And so sometimes we have a shameful identity. The difference between shame and guilt, we explain that guilt is something I did wrong, but shame is that I am wrong.

And sometimes we've done things that have cut so deep into us that the sin becomes our identity. And so we have a wonderful testimony that we would love to share with you. Of how Jesus came and with His blood changed Laura's identity from being rejected and being alone and not being able to come into God's presence.

And now bringing her into God's family, being one that is loved and cared for and one that belongs with the Lord and with His people. I wish I had known sooner, to bring this big secret to Jesus and to bring it to people that I trusted within the church.

Laura's Testimony of Healing After Abortion

Because I would have found freedom so much sooner and God could have dealt with all of that stuff. I was saved at the age of 29. Jesus came into my life in a beautiful, beautiful way. It was during worship in JoshGen Sunningdale. He started slowly but surely unpacking so much baggage that I had picked up over my 29 years of life.

And one of those things was at the age of 19, I had an abortion. And when I first got saved, I was like, no one is ever going to know about this. I'm not going to share the story with anybody, it's going to go to my grave.

I was really convinced, the enemy had me convinced that I was going to be kicked out of church. Because I had had an abortion when I was 19. And I didn't want to share that story with anyone. And one day during worship, I felt God tell me to tell a very good friend of mine, Marelies, what I had done.

And I was terrified. I stood in worship and I was crying. And she could clearly see something was going on with me. And she came up to me with another friend and they were praying for me. And everything that they were praying, it just started poking that thing more and more and more and more.

And I broke down. Worship was over. They took me to the side because they felt they needed to keep praying. They could see there was a demonic stronghold on me. And I just kept shaking my head and I was like, I can't, I can't, I can't.

And it literally felt like I had two hands around my neck choking me. And I was actually making noises where I couldn't speak, I could barely breathe. All of a sudden I just said "Jesus." And in that moment I just said, "When I was 19 I had an abortion."

And that's when I broke down and I just started crying and crying. And they carried on praying for me. And they carried on loving me which was a pretty strange feeling, to still feel loved even though I had brought this big bad secret to life—this thing that I felt made me unlovable.

And so we had a prayer session for me two days later, and it was all about God's love for me. And there was so much healing and so much deliverance. God's love, God's forgiveness. Flowing out of that, I've just felt so much freedom. But I still felt like there was something that needed to be dealt with.

So I asked the ladies to organize another prayer meeting for me, which they did. And in that prayer session, it was all about forgiving myself. Because I felt like I'd done something that was unforgivable. So it was like God was healing me in stages.

So the first stage, receiving God's love and God's forgiveness. The second stage was forgiving myself and being able to move on from there. One of the key things with the abortion was that I hadn't grieved. They instructed me for a year, "You are going to grieve for your baby."

And to receive permission from somebody to grieve over something that I'd done, for me it was just so freeing. I was then able to put the abortion almost away from myself. Because it was something that the enemy had done. The enemy had stolen from me.

And yes, I had done it, but it was also in ignorance. It was believing a lie that it was just tissue. There was all sorts of worldly things at the age of 19 that I was involved in. So I didn't know right from wrong necessarily.

Healing After Abortion Through Church Prayer

Although deep down I didn't know because when I got saved, I obviously then had all these emotions about it. The third part of my healing was one night in church. Margo came forward and she said that she felt like there was somebody who had an abortion.

And that the lady felt like that she wouldn't be a good mom one day. And when I heard that, I was like, wow, that's me. Cause I started crying and I felt that resonated. So I went to her and I said to her, the lady you're talking about is me.

And she prayed for me. And then again, there was another level of healing that God had brought. As a teenager, I vowed that I would never get married, never have children. And God brought restoration in that area too. I have an amazing husband, Lovemore, and now we have a son.

And the fourth part of that healing was actually having my son. And the moment I saw him, it was bittersweet. Bitter because of thinking about the first child. And sweet because God had restored me something so beautiful. A son that I could love, a son that I could physically hold in my hands and I praised God for that.

I praise God for restoring. For what He's done, what He'd done in my life. It's just been amazing how God has brought such healing and restoration. From that horrible act I did at 19 and how I wasn't kicked out of church. I'm still very much in church.

I've been totally transformed from believing that I was going to be single my whole life. I'm going to live for myself. To actually having a husband, having a family, and serving Him in Khayelitsha, JoshGen Congregation. So, yeah, this has been amazing, an amazing journey.

Bringing a Hidden Secret to Jesus

And only God could have done it. I could never have done it myself. And just the healing and restoration that He's brought has been incredible. What I would like to tell anyone that is in a similar position, where they've got this unforgivable, dark secret that they're holding on to, is to first of all take it to Jesus. Your secret is no secret to Him. He's seen it all, He's seen the best of you, He's seen the worst of you. And I just want to encourage you to run to Jesus with that.

And nothing you can say or do would make Him love you any less. And the second thing would be to bring it into the light with a trusted brother or sister. Because, there's just so much love to be found within the family. And just for that burden to be lifted, it's a burden that I carried for 10 years and the day that I shared it, it was no longer my burden to carry.

It was our burden to carry. My family and me, as well as Jesus. So, I wish I had known sooner, to bring this big secret to Jesus and to bring it to people that I trusted within the church. Because I would have found freedom so much sooner and God could have dealt with all of that stuff.

All of that unforgiveness of myself. Unforgiveness towards my boyfriend at the time. Jesus could have unpacked everything and I would have been freer a lot sooner. But I'm glad I eventually did. I'm glad that I eventually came forward, gave it to Jesus. Spoke to trusted friends, and I could find the freedom that Jesus ultimately would want me to walk in.

Applying the Blood of Jesus to Identity

And that's also led to being married and having a baby. After hearing about the blood of Jesus and hearing this wonderful testimony how God changed a person's identity, we would like to give you an opportunity in a small group to discuss, maybe there's some areas of identity that you are struggling with.

And giving you an opportunity to apply the blood of Jesus in prayer to your own spiritual life. And to experience the freedom that God brings, in giving us this wonderful gift of His blood and the power that is in the blood of Jesus Christ.

So we're going to be doing that now.