Jesus: Offering for Sin

Larry Kirkpatrick ++ Mentone Church of Seventh-day Adventists ++ 12 July 2003

Why did it please the God to bruise Jesus?

It did not give God pleasure to inflict pain upon Jesus. Rather, it was His will that Jesus bear man's punishment in order that His plan of salvation might be filled with its potential: the salvation of humankind. God's law must be fulfilled. His character must still stand. Yet man might be saved if he will receive the sacrifice that God makes in Christ.

On the contrary, the suffering of Christ was not desirable on its own. When God chose the imagery of father and son in portraying the relationship between Jesus and the Father, it was because, like the human relationship between a father and a son, no father rejoices when he sees his children suffer in pain.

God was willing and Jesus was willing for that matter, to put themselves through great suffering in order to make our salvation possible. The Father suffered with the Son. But they both looked to what was to be achieved. They both saw a race redeemed, a people made in the image of God prepared and repaired for an existence of bliss that would last them an eternity. It was because of the love of God for Jesus and for the human race that they endured all that they did for us. Jesus experienced great grief, but with an eye focused on eternity and joy yet to come.

Why was His soul made an offering for sin?

No other person's soul would do. Jesus was God and had in Himself the character of God. He alone equaled the law of the Father and took human flesh. He was in flesh what God's law was in God's heart. Besides, He was God. He was a being of eternal nature, having in Himself all the love and perfection that the Father has. But in the divine plan, it was He who humbled Himself.

He submitted to unimaginable shrinking for us. He, who could be everywhere at once in His creation submitted to a limiting of His senses, a diminution of His powers. Voluntarily He laid aside what He had—for eternity—used as His own. He made a sacrifice for a race of rebels, without which, they would remain rebels. They would exist for but a whispering moment and then be consumed by their own fallen affection for evil.

Looking at our race fallen, what was there to love? But He loved us anyway. Undeserving, because of the Fall trending relentlessly toward evil, with seemingly nothing in us worthy of His love, still He loved. Still He gave. Still He went up to the Cross and stretched out His arms and embraced a world spitting at Him, snarling at him. As He hung upon the Cross naked, soldiers gambled over who would get His garments. As they had pounded the nails through His hands and feet, His sentiments had been, “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34).

The blood of an unselfish person who is also God was shed on our behalf. He first loved us, and so now we can begin to love Him. (1 John 4:19). What a privilege! What a privilege! What a gift His blood is for us. We had nothing to offer. But He paid in the coin of divine character so that we could be changed to His likeness. We owe Him everything.

What is the seed Jesus will see?

God the Father was to see Jesus dying on the Cross for man, the divine sacrifice made. And He was also to see the raising up of a seed, a remnant, a people at the last who would follow the Lamb wherever he would go (Revelation 14:4). And where had Jesus gone? To the Cross, to the place of ultimate sacrifice. Whereas He was the ultimate sacrifice, we would be enabled to follow Him as the Lamb. We would be enabled to through His grace and power set aside the mighty compulsions and deadly loves and psychologically bent practices that we have poisoned ourselves with.

When Jesus sees the beauty of changed lives in those who follow Him, He will rejoice with a rejoicing that is only beginning. He knows that eternity stretches out in front of those of us who are willing to see the cheapness and tinsel of earth for what it is, and look past that to the glories of a world we can hardly begin to imagine. Heaven will see people enabled to live loving, truly loving, obedient lives through Christ.

How shall God's pleasure prosper in His hand?

What is God's pleasure? What is the pleasure of a being who is love (1John 4:16)? He is a God who is love and who is holy. What is His pleasure? It is His pleasure to bring those made in His image to the place where they too may truly love. God's pleasure will prosper in the hand of Jesus when He looks out upon the redeemed of humanity and knows that for eternity, they too will be holy, they too will love.

In the beginning made in God's image, in the end of God's rescue plan, we will after all choose freely to reflect that image. Imagine for a moment what it would be like if, in all of planet earth, at least the population of just San Bernardino county or Riverside county were converted and determined that they would live as those reflecting the image of He who is love. What if every person living in just one of those counties began living that way? Why, the whole world would hear of it! It would be astonishing. But what if the whole population of the state of California began to love like God who is love? What if every American did? What if the whole planet did? You see, that is to what we are looking; an existence in which to every human you turn you see the indisputable reflection of the Creator, of love.

Because of Jesus' willingness to sacrifice Himself for us, we can come to such a time. We can experience such a thing. No, not that every Californian will be converted and love as God loves, but so that one day very soon the conflict between good and evil will be decided, be ended, and we can all get on past life's kindergarten and move forward to occupy the experience waiting for us. To all be loving as the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are loving. All of our empathy for one another, all of our sympathy for one another, will be built up out of pure motivations. We will love others all the time, and be loved by others all the time. But most of all we will look to Him who is love and be enabled to love Him in return with a beautiful, undeserved reflection of His love to us.

And that will be worth all that we've ever borne and so much more. May His name be praised for His goodness toward men. May we soon see Jesus face to face!

Pastor Larry Kirkpatrick is an ordained minister of the gospel. Since 1994 he has served in the American Southwest as pastor to several churches. He received his BA in Religion from Southern Adventist University in 1994 and a Master of Divinity from Andrews University in 1999 with a specialization in Adventist Studies. While in Michigan he was employed by the General Conference at the White Estate Berrien Springs branch office. More important than his scholastic preparation has been his immersion in the biblical and Spirit of Prophecy materials. He is author of the 2003 book Real Grace for Real People. Presently he serves as Pastor of the Mentone Church of Seventh-day Adventists, located near Loma Linda, California. Larry is married to Pamela. The couple presently live in Highland, California along with their two children, Etienne and Melinda.