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Peter 1: 18-19
You know that you were
ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your ancestors, not with
perishable things like silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without defect or blemish.
This is straight out of the Old
Testament. Exodus 12, the first
Passover. The blood of a lamb without
defect or blemish was painted onto the doorposts and lintels of the Israelites
and the angel of death passed over those houses while it proceeded to take the
lives of the firstborn of the Egyptians.
It was the tenth and most terrible plague, the one by which the people
of Israel were finally freed by Pharaoh.
It was a ransom, blood for blood, blood
of the lamb for the blood of the firstborn.
And Jesus is both the Lamb of God and the Firstborn of God. Like the lamb, he was slaughtered that the
angel of death, the punisher for our sins, might pass over us and we might live
forever by the grace of God.
It is the language of triumph out of
sacrifice. This is the way with
humanity. Talk only of the good, the
joyful, and the wondrous, and we are flighty optimists. Humanity is defined by pain. We are defined by what bends us, threatens to
break us. So Jesus went to that place
where we might be most broken, in death and hell, and from there came back to
bring life to us all.
A lot of Christians spend a lot of time
talking about how one must be ‘right with Jesus’. See how far Jesus went to be right with us.
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