During His time here on Earth, Jesus said a lot of things about His purpose in coming. He told His parents early on that He had to be in His Father's house (Luke 2:40-52). He came to do His Father's will (John 6:38). He came to be a servant (Matt 10:28). We know these things. Jesus also told us that He came to die (John 2:19-21). He came to lay His life down for His sheep (John 10:11). He clearly stated, that He came to give His life as a ransom for many (Mark 10:45).
It shouldn't be a surprise. Isaiah famously wrote about the Messiah as a suffering servant. "Surely our griefs He Himself bore, and our sorrows He carried; yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities. The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray; each of us has turned to his own way. But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him" (Isa 53:4-6). Isaiah's Messiah took our punishment for our sin on Himself -- smitten by God -- and died "for our transgressions" -- in our place. His death served as a substitution for the punishment we so richly earned. He "gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed" (Titus 2:14).
Jesus said He came to give His life as a ransom for many. He came to pay the redemptive price that we owed. (That's the meaning of the term, "ransom".) He gave Himself as a substitution in our place and took our sin and our punishment. Jesus said, "This is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins" (Matt 26:28). Dance around it if you like, but you do so in direct opposition to Jesus's own words and to the rest of Scripture (John 1:29; 2 Cor 5:21; Gal 3:13; 1 Peter 2:24; 1 John 2:2; 1 Peter 3:18; Rom 6:23; Matt 20:28; John 10:18; Rom 3:25-26; etc.). One has to wonder, then, why there are those who oppose this clearly biblical principle, even in the face of Christ?
3 comments:
In response to your last line, two reasons come to my mind right away: (1) people don’t want to believe that they need a savior at all; and (2) if they do accept that they cannot please God as they are, they prefer to fix that on their own, through their own efforts and methods.
In either case, it doesn't sound "Christian."
Anyone that says that Jesus didn't die for our sins but for any other reason clearly doesn't understand the Old Testament or the severity of our transgressions.
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