Separation and the Cure

Worse, Not Better

James 1:15 ESV

15 Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.

Why do we constantly work to try to do better at things?

How do we deal with sin?

By trying to atone, work to get better.

Confess to others.

Hide or avoid by drugs or alcohol.

How does/did God deal with sin?

He set a price

He sent Jesus

He paid the price (We are set free)

Romans 6:23 ESV

23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Why?

Joseph in Genesis 45

The cross, a means of punishment for the worst offender, became the means for good news to come into the world.

The only hope man had was from outside our time and space because all of mankind was spotted.

Do you know what kind of lamb had to be brought to sacrifice?

No blemishes, no spots, no broken bones, no other color than white in its fur. It had to be perfect or it would be rejected. No human on this earth fit the qualification. Only one born of the seed of woman, without a man stained by sin, could have been the lamb of God.

Ephesians 2:8–9 ESV

8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

Whose grace?

Whose mercy?

Whose sacrifice?

This is beginning to sound a lot like the covenant made by God with Abraham.

Abraham could not fulfill the covenant to make Israel a great nation.

Abraham could not be good enough, he didn’t even have a primary heir when it was made.

Only God could do it.

Supernaturally God, the Holy Spirit, came upon Mary and cause her to have a baby. She didn’t slip off and fool around with Joseph and then God used that baby. God created a baby using her egg and God’s spiritual being to come into the world fully human and fully God.

I don’t even begin to try to explain it fully because I don’t understand it fully. I am just glad he was willing to do it.

Ephesians 1:4 ESV

4 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love.

God’s love, His great love for us is the only reason we have any hope.

God restored sinful people to a holy God through himself.

Ransom Theory

Satan held prisoners and God paid the debt to satan to release them. This doesn’t work because the sin was not against Satan, it was against God. The payment was made for God’s judgement against sin.

Satisfaction Theory

The payment owed to God for sin could only be paid by a man. That is why Jesus came as a man, fully human, to pay a human debt. God paid the debt in human form. Again the covenant being taken up by God and made by God. Only he can satisfy it.

Moral Influence Theory

We are drawn to Christ through his suffering on the cross.His sacrificial love and suffering draws us to him. It creates a deep admiration in human kind for Christ that influences us to go to him.

The new Testament does not give us any theories, just a series of word pictures.

We were in hopeless debt and Jesus paid it: Luke 7:41-50

We were slaves and Jesus redeemed us Eph 1:7

We were condemned criminals and Jesus bore the penalty to set us free Rom 15:16

We were unclean Gentiles unworthy and excluded and Jesus made a way for us Eph 2:13—14

We were in disgrace and far from home and Jesus brought us back to the family Eph 2:18-19

We were in prison to satan and Jesus delivered us Col 2:15

The cross destroyed the barrier between God and man.

Tell the story of the crucifixion and the darkness and temple veil.

The Resurrection

Peter Acts 4:12

Acts 4:12 ESV

12 And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”

Every apostle except John gave their lives preaching the gospel to the world.