By Sheryl Murray
What can wash away my sin?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus!
What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus!
When Adam and Eve chose to rebel against God’s love and authority, the result was separation from His loving presence as well as physical and spiritual death. Truly the wages of sin was death (Romans 6:23). There was no turning back and no way two humans could pay the full penalty of their sin and be reconciled to God.
But in the midst of sorrow and loss, God also made a promise–He Himself would send someone through mankind who would pay this penalty and renew the precious relationship that had been lost.
Throughout the years, God provided partial pictures of His plan. Noah was blessed with a rainbow of hope that God hadn’t forgotten mankind. Abraham was willing to offer up his son as a sacrifice to show his love and obedience. Moses had the Israelites place lamb’s blood over their doorposts to ward off the angel of death.
Then God set up an elaborate system of sacrifices to foreshadow the ultimate sacrifice of His son who would take on the sin of the world and finally re-establish the relationship between mankind and his Creator. For hundreds of years bulls, lambs, and birds were offered on an altar–first in a tent, then in a temple. Season after season, year after year, sacrifices were offered that could never fully pay the wages of death caused by sin.
Finally the time came when the promise was to be fulfilled–a sacrifice that would cover sin and bridge the gap between mankind and God. God sent His only son Jesus, fully God and fully human, to take on the weight of the world’s sin once and for all. This was the perfect sacrifice.
Jesus died for us on the cross. He took on the burden of sin that would never go away no matter how many sacrifices were offered on the altar. Only the blood of the sinless lamb of God could truly take away sin. Jesus’ sacrifice was the perfect sacrifice, so much better than the ones of before that had to be repeated year after year by each person. And Jesus died for all of us–male and female, from all ends of the earth, past, present and future.
The Better sacrifice. The perfect sacrifice. Jesus–once for all!
This is all my hope and peace:
Nothing but the blood of Jesus!
This is all my righteousness:
Nothing but the blood of Jesus!
O precious is the flow that makes me white as snow;
No other fount I know;
Nothing but the blood of Jesus!
Robert Lowry 1876
Equip Her 