How Jesus Saves … “Jesus our Propitiation”
Easter is just two weeks away, and Pastor Dan has been preaching about “How Jesus Saves” in these weeks leading up to Easter. That is what makes Christianity different from any other religion — we believe that God sent his son to die in our place. Each of Pastor Dan’s messages this month centers on one important word that explains “How Jesus Saves” and each message comes from the Book of Romans.
March 3, 2024 focused on the Greek word PROPITIATION and how Jesus is our propitiation:
Romans 3:23-24 “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. All are justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.”
Romans 3:25 “God presented him (Jesus) as a sacrifice of propitiation by his blood to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness because in his divine forbearance (God delayed an extreme punishment) he had passed over.
The BIG Definition of propitiation is “a sacrifice that bears God’s wrath so God becomes favorably disposed toward us”.
Jesus was offered, by God, to be someone who would bear God’s wrath, all of it, against sin, so that God looks at us in a good/favorable light — those that have given our lives to Him. Because Jesus bore the weight of our sin and the punishment of it, bearing the wrath of God, we have the ability to have a relationship with our creator again.
John Owen, an old Puritan pastor said, (Pastor Dan paraphrased), “There’s four elements to explain propitiation: 1) There’s an OFFENSE, something that was done wrong to somebody. Sin is a serious offense. It is an offense against God. Sin offends a holy, perfect God. Sin makes us an enemy. He cannot have sin in his presence. Therefore, every time we sin, we take a step back (away) from God, and the distance between us grows, and our relationship is broken and not getting any better until by his grace, we overcome that sin, and as we draw on fellowship with him, we begin to grow. 2) There’s an OFFENDER — us, all humanity has offended God, and it’s passed down, generation to generation through family — that we have the sin nature. 3) There is the OFFENDED — God, who is offended by our sin. The word “wrath” is used in the Bible 580 times, most of the times it is mentioned, it is against one thing — sin. Many people want to think of God only as love and forgiveness and as a healer, and those are all true. However, God is also a God of justice and wrath. And God has wrath against sin because he knows that sin is destroying fellowship. Sin breaks the relationship that mankind can have with God. This wrath is the same wrath that we see in Genesis that motivates God to regret that he made man, and causes a flood — a flood, caused by the wrath of God against sin, that killed millions of people. It is also the wrath that caused God to destroy a city that did not care to ever repent — Sodom and Gomorrah, which God turned to ash. That is the wrath of God that Jesus bore in our place. That is propitiation. And lastly, 4) there is a SATISFIER — someone that satisfies that wrath of God, someone that meets the debt, the massive debt because of our sin. So someone or something comes in as a satisfier. In the Old Testament, it was two goats that would be sacrificed. Jesus fulfilled what the two goats could not do permanently. Jesus was a Satisfier of God’s wrath. He was innocent. That’s what makes the death of Christ so unjust by human measure, that Jesus was innocent. Innocent and killed at the hands of false accusations, killed at the hands of his own creation. That’s unjust. If we were to see anyone paying for someone else’s wrongdoing today, we would say, “that’s unjust. We need justice.” Because Jesus took this punishment for us, God looks upon us favorably.
The Point of this messsage is: At Jesus’ pain, God’s wrath was restrained.
How does this help us? Well, the reality is, we didn’t get what we deserve. Jesus got what we deserve. But, as a result, we get what we don’t deserve. We get mercey and grace from God. We don’t deserve it. The sacraments of communion represent the body of Christ and the blood of Christ. When we take communion, we better be grateful to God for what has done. Jesus was my propitiation. He was your propitiation.
Things to Think About:
God’s not mad at you. (1 John 4:10) “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice (propitiation) for our sins.”
Stop punishing yourself. (Hebrews 2:17) “Therefore, He (Jesus) had to be made like his brothers (us) in all things, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.”
Jesus bore more than we can comprehend. (1 John 2:2) “And He (Jesus) is the reconciliation (propitiation) for our sins: and not for ours only; but also for the sins of the whole world.”