Transcript

ANNOUNCER: We are continuing our discussion from the last episode. Did Jesus pay the penalty for our sins? This is part two. Welcome, friend. Glad you’re here today. This is Grace in Focus. It is a ministry of the Grace Evangelical Society. Our website is www.faithalone.org. You can learn a lot about us there. We have a seminary, a free online seminary. It’s free if you maintain a 3.0 average. And if you stay at it for a few semesters, you can earn an MDiv degree. Go through the application process. Get ready to study with us next semester. We’d love to have you. All the details you need at www.faithalone.org. 

And now with today’s continuing discussion, here’s Bob Wilkin, along with Sam Marr. 

SAM: All right, everybody. We’re jumping into our part two of “Did Jesus pay the penalty for our sins”. Bob, we kind of left off halfway through John 1:29. So let’s pick up there. We saw that John 1:29 does not teach that Jesus’ blood removes the penalty for our sins. So what is John 1:29 teaching? 

BOB: John says, “Behold the Lamb of God who”, present tense, “takes away the sin of the world”. But most commentators feel that this is a futuristic present because He didn’t do it until they went to the cross. So they say we might even translate “who will take away the sin of the world” or “will soon take away the sin of the world”. Raymond Brown, who’s a famous New Testament scholar, he said that the singular “sin” in John 1:29 refers to our sinful condition and that the plural “sins” refers to sinful actions. What he’s saying is Jesus took away our sinful condition so that no longer are our sins the issue in eternal life. 

Now, you asked me about, so what does the death of Christ accomplish? Remember, we were talking about that? And I said that it accomplished different things for different groups of people. I have an article called The Benefits of Christ Death Restricted and Unrestricted. I encourage you to go to faithalone.org and read it. But let me give you an example. John 1:29 and 1 John 2:2 apply to every single person who has ever lived or ever will live, He has removed the sin barrier for all, so that sin is no longer the issue, the issue is we’re dead, we need life. 

However, that’s not all the blood of Christ does. For one thing, at the moment that we believe in Christ, all our sins are forgiven. Colossians 2:14-15 or Acts 10:43. So that we start the Christian life with a clean slate. And it’s the blood of Christ that does that. And it doesn’t do it for everybody. Forgiveness is not for the unbeliever. Until you believe, you don’t get that benefit of Christ’s death. 

SAM: But that also means when people say your sins are forgiven past, present, and future, in that sense, they’re not forgiven future because we need to keep confessing our sin, asking for forgiveness. And that’s kind of our feet being washed or cleansed as we walk in our Christian life. 

BOB: That’s a good point. In fact, that would be a more restricted point of the blood of Christ. Every believer gets the forgiveness of his sins up to the point at which he’s born again. That’s why we don’t come up to a new believer and go, okay, I want you to make a list of all your sins you’ve committed up till now. And you need to confess those to get in fellowship with God. 

SAM: Right. If you’re born again, you’re a baby now. And babies didn’t sin before they were born. 

BOB: Right. So all that washed away. There’s also the issue of 1 John 1:7, which says, “If we walk in the light as He is in the light, then the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin”. You see, 1 John 1:7, confessing our sins, though we might be forgiven and cleansed, only works if we’re walking in the light. If we’re the prodigal son in the far country, we need to repent first in order to get back in fellowship with God. It wouldn’t have been enough for the prodigal son to say, oh, I’ve sinned against my father. Okay, I’m good now. No, he had to go back to the father to get back and fellowship with the father. Same thing with us. If we’re walking in the light, then we can confess our sins and have cleansing and forgiveness. But if we’re not walking in the light, then the remedy is turning from our sins, repentance. 

I think it’s important to recognize the blood of Christ isn’t just to make us savable. It’s also so that we have forgiveness, and it’s also so we have ongoing forgiveness. And there’s even a fourth thing. You remember where he said in 1 John, he laid down his life for us. Therefore, what should we do? 1 John 3:16. If I look to Him on the cross, and I say, that’s the way I should live. I should lay down my life for others. That’s what I’m called to do, right? It’s to love the brethren. And so that’s another benefit of the blood of Christ. It points the way on how we should live. Having said all that, there are a few other verses people use to say, He paid the penalty for our sins. I’ve got three here. Maybe we can briefly go over all three. 

SAM: Yeah, first up is Isaiah 53:5-6. It says, “But he was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities, and by his stripes we are healed, and we like sheep have gone astray, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” 

BOB: Isaiah 52 and 53 deals with what’s called the suffering servant, that the Messiah was not only going to come to rule and reign over the Israel and the world, but he was going to first die for Israel and for the world. And that’s what that talks about. But notice there’s nothing in Isaiah 52 or 53 that talks about paying the penalty for our sins. What it says is by his stripes we are healed. In order to understand that one, I think we need to look to the New Testament verse that quotes that verse. 

A lot of people, as you know in the charismatic movement, use that expression by his stripes we were healed to refer to what? 

SAM: Physical healing, right? 

BOB: Right. So they say, either we don’t get sick or they say, if you get sick, it’s because you’re not depending on him. And so just claim the cross and you won’t have any sickness. I’m surprised that people who are charismatic ever die. Why would they die if “by his stripes you were healed” means all of our physical infirmities goes away. Why would we ever have a heart attack? Why would we ever have a stroke? Why would a heart ever stop? Why would we ever die? I mean, it would seem to me if that’s physical, then we would never experience physical death. 

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BOB: We know from 1 Peter 2:24 what that verse is talking about. So maybe you could read that one too. 

SAM: “Christ who himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree that we having died the sins might live for righteousness by whose stripes you were healed.” 

BOB: We having died to sin. By Jesus’ death on the cross, did the whole world die to sin? 

SAM: No. 

BOB: Okay, so when do we die to sin? 

SAM: When you’re born again, but then… 

BOB: That’s positionally we die to sin. Now in terms of our experience, it’s ongoing. Right. But Romans 6:1-6, talks about this subject and it says, when we believed in Christ, we died to sin. But notice what Peter says there. He says, having died to sin, what? 

SAM: Might live for righteousness? 

BOB: Might live for righteousness. And then isn’t that when he says, 

SAM: by whose stripes you were healed, by Christ’s stripes. 

BOB: So by Christ’s stripes, we are healed, refers to having the ability to live righteously in my experience. It’s a spiritual healing. It’s not talking about healing from physical death. It’s a spiritual healing from the sinful acts we have. We died with Him, therefore we can live with him, therefore we should live righteously. That verse doesn’t say He took away sin’s penalty. What it basically says, it took away sin’s power that we now have the freedom to live righteously. And that’s also Romans chapter 6 around verses 17 and 18. We’re now slaves of righteousness in our position. And if we yield our members to God as instruments of righteousness, then we will live righteously. Okay, what’s the third verse sometimes people use? 

SAM: Colossians 2:13-14, “And you being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And he has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.” 

BOB: So the cross does allude to the blood of Christ. But the question is, does every single person in the world have what he’s talking about there? What does he say? 

SAM: He made us alive together with Him. 

BOB: So has every person on planet earth been made alive together with Christ? 

SAM: No. 

BOB: So who’s he talking about believers or unbelievers? 

SAM: Born again believers. 

BOB: Born again believers. And what do they get? 

SAM: They get life with him. They get their trespasses forgiven. 

BOB: And didn’t we talk about trespasses forgiven is one of the benefits of the blood of Christ? At the moment of the new birth, part of our experience is, we’re in fellowship with God. We start with a clean slate. We’re forgiven. But that’s not talking about penalty for sin. That’s talking about one of the benefits we get from the blood of Christ. If we’re a believer, the very fact that Jesus died on the cross does not mean that the unbeliever has died with Christ. He hasn’t. The unbeliever has been made alive with Christ. He hasn’t. It doesn’t mean the unbeliever has the forgiveness of sins. He doesn’t. What it means is the unbeliever is saveable. Jesus has propitiated his sin. That is, He has satisfied God concerning his sin. 

And so I think the thing we need to recognize is people mean well when they say, Jesus paid the penalty for our sins. But biblically, what He did for the world is He removes the sin barrier. He made the world saveable. And when we evangelize, we need to make the bullseye clear. The issue is we’re dead. We need the life. The issue is not we’re sinners. We need our sins taken away. They’ve already been taken away. That’s the good news. We can start out with that. Jesus has already removed your sin barrier.

SAM: Right. And there’s just to be clear, there’s nothing wrong with evangelizing and talking about sin and the cross and Christ’s sacrifice and all of that. But what we’re saying is believing those things can lead you to believing in Christ for everlasting life. But believing in the cross doesn’t give life. It’s not a person that can promise life to anybody. Christ is a person who He is God and He promised life to those who believe in Him. And so the cross was a means to that end. But that is not the object of belief.

BOB: Right. And in John’s Gospel, it’s one of the signs, John 18 and 19. That’s the eighth sign. And all the signs were designed to lead people to believe in Jesus for everlasting life. The heart of the Christian life is Jesus’ death, resurrection, ascension, and soon return. The blood of Christ is essential to the Christian life. But when we’re talking about the penalty for sin, that’s a separate issue, a separate question. 

I hope that helps, in the meantime, keep grace in focus. 

ANNOUNCER: Would you be interested in some free ebooks on topics you hear on this program? Well, if you are, you need to come visit us at faithalone.org. That’s faithalone.org. We would love to hear from you. Maybe you’ve got a question, comment, or some feedback. If you do, please don’t hesitate to send us a message. Here’s our email address. It’s radio at faithalone.org. That’s radio at faithalone.org. And when you do very important, please let us know your radio station call letters and the city of your location.

On our next episode: how are iniquities passed from Father to Son? Be sure to join us, and until then, let’s keep grace in focus.