MID-WEEK MANNA FROM PASTOR NAT’S DESK:
August 20, 2023
God’s Purposes Revealed by Inspiration
SACRIFICE: FIRST PART OF PLAN OF REDEMPTION
“It (the promised ‘Seed of the woman) shall bruise thy head (the serpent, Satan), and thou shalt bruise His heel (not head).” See Gen. 3:15, the first and foundational verse of all the promises and prophecies from Genesis to Revelation.
By omniscient foresight and omnipotent power, the grand plan of redemption, the divine solution to tackle, defeat, and forever eradicate the “mystery of iniquity” of and in the great controversy, was “prepared before the foundations of the earth were laid.” It instantly activated at the same moment of earth time, the same place of the still-pure earth and living space of the first couple’s garden of Eden home. Thus, in Biblical fact, truth, precept and principle, there was a Savior the same instant there was a sinner! Keeping this grand, amazingly wonderful truth close to our hearts, our minds can better appreciate the two-part steps of the plan of redemption, namely, sacrifice, followed by intercession.
In its further expansion, we see the glory of Calvary on fallen earth in the death of the sacrificial “Lamb of God”, who, after His resurrection and ascension becomes the “all-powerful and merciful High Priest (Advocate, Intercessor, Mediator; righteous Judge of all the earth in the holy places of the sanctuary in heaven; we see the essential nature of the two parts and successive stages of the work of atonement (at-one ment) in: the sacrificial atonement by and in the substitutionary death of the innocent sacrificial victim as the only acceptable “ransom” price for the sinner and its blood for the cleansing of sin (“life is in the blood”), followed by the intercessory atonement of the High Priest, pleading His own blood for and in behalf of the penitent sinners.
All these and much more,
in and for the redemption, preservation and restoration of the immutable and everlasting principles of God’s eternal law of love and righteousness, the foundation of His everlasting kingdom of eternity past and eternity future, the very transcript of His unchanging character and nature, as well and for man, the only creature He “made in His image and after His own likeness.”
Bearing in mind that “without the shedding of blood there can be no remission (forgiveness, pardon) of sins,” we resume quoting from the SOP regarding the first part of sacrificial atonement as first taught and symbolized in its typical, clean animal sacrifices as well as in the others specified in the comprehensive system of sacrifices:
“The sacrificial offerings were ordained by God to man a PERPETUAL REMINDER and a PENITENTIAL ACKNOWLEDGEMENT of his sin, and a CONFESSION OF HIS FAITH in the promised [future] Redeemer. They [the sacrificed innocent victims] were designed to IMPRESS upon the fallen race the SOLEMN TRUTH that it was SIN THAT CAUSED DEATH.”
NOTE: All who claim to be disciples or followers of Christ, “Christians,” particularly those professing to be anticipating, watching or waiting (not automatically preparing and prepared for) for the second advent of the Bridegroom should constantly remember this: death is not simply the “wages” of sin, which is ‘transgression of the law,” it is the CAUSE of death! Thus, sin, which is disobedience to any and all of the “letter and spirit”, precepts and principles of God’s law, moral and natural, is death already. “Twice dead” means “dead in their sins” though alive physically, and unless speedily repented of and totally forsaken, are merely awaiting the reward of “the second death”, the eternal death of the incorrigibly disobedient sinners who persistently refuse to “overcome even as Christ overcame.”
“To Adam, the offering of the FIRST sacrifice, was a MOST PAINFUL ceremony. His HAND [not of the officiating priest| must be RAISED TO TAKE LIFE, which ONLY GOD could give. It was the first time he hade ever WITNESSED death, and he kea that HAD he been OBEDIENT to God, there would have been NO DEATH OF MAN OR BEAST.
“As he slew the INNOCENT victim, he TREMBLED at the thought that his sin must shed the blood of the SPOTLESS LAMB OF GOD. This scene gave him a DEEPER AND MORE VIViD sense of the GREATNESS of his transgression, which nothing but the death of God’s dear Son could expiate [atone for]. And he MARVELED at the INFINITE GOODNESS that would give such a RANSOM to save the guilty. A star of HOPE illumined the dark and terrible future, and he RELIEVED it of its UTTER desolation.” (End quote PP 68).
If we had any of the original feelings and senses of the first Adam, even if already fallen and sinful, we would somehow realize what Paul meant and applied to the supposed “sons and daughters” of the “second Adam,” Christ Himself! Note: Read Heb. 5: 4, 5 first. Verse 6 continues: “If they shall fall away, to renew them again to repentance; seeing they CRUCIFY to themselves the Son of God AFRESH, and put Him to an OPEN SHAME [as in the horrific and revolting spectacle of public crucifixion].
Do we still “tremble” when we commit sin, which is death, or do we counter the conviction by asserting confidently, “I am already safe and sound;” that is, “rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing?”
To be continued next MWM, God willing. Bless all, NMF.