Thought for the Week

God created humankind to have fellowship with Him. In the beginning that worked. God had fellowship with man. But God was God and Sovereign. Man could and did have fellowship with God. But God required man to be obedient to Him. Man rebelled. The rebellion was called sin. Sin separated man from God. In order for man to get back into fellowship with God, a sacrifice was required. It needed to be a blood sacrifice. The sin nature of man is passed on to his children. As man passes on physical characteristics, (one nose, two ears, two eyes, etc.), so he passes on the character of sin. We do not need to teach children to be greedy, jealous, violent, to lie, etc. They are all that; naturally inheriting it from parents. God ultimately provided a perfect Sacrifice to cover all sin for all time. That Sacrifice is Jesus. He is called, “The Lamb of God, Who takes away the sin of the world.” There is a demonstration of that recorded in Exodus 12ff. A lamb was chosen. It was examined to be sure it had no blemish or defect. One afternoon it was killed. Its blood was caught in a basin and sprinkled (smeared) on the lintel and doorposts of the house. Now there is much more to this story but suffice it to say, “That night, the Death Angel came through the land. If there was blood on the door, the angel passed over it, doing nothing. If there was no blood, the firstborn child of that household was slain.” This was the first observance of “Passover.” About 1,400 years later, Jesus Christ, “The Lamb of God,” was killed (He was not a martyr, murdered, for He gave His life willingly) in fulfillment of God’s plan to provide a substitutionary, perfect sacrifice for the sins of all mankind. This was God’s part in the plan to bring humankind back into right relationship/fellowship with Him. Man’s part is to confess his sin and accept the Sacrifice made on his behalf. From that point on, it is back to the beginning. Man is to have fellowship with God and be obedient to Him. In the “Suggested Scripture” selections, I will give several Scriptures that demonstrate God, as Shepherd seeking lost mankind, as sheep. God’s intention and fervent desire is to get back into right relationship and fellowship with man. The difficulty is that God cannot co-exist with sin. God must destroy sin. If sin is in and part of man, destruction must follow. So, God’s plan is for the sin to be destroyed in man, and man purged of sin. Once that is done, and the sin is gone, God and man can have that originally planned for and desired fellowship with one another. So, The Lamb has the prominent role. He is the perfect Sacrifice. But there is more to the story. All the lambs sacrificed at Passover before this, were killed and stayed dead. The Plan of God called for the Lamb of God to be resurrected from the Dead. He died to pay the price/penalty for sin. He rose again, from the Dead, to demonstrate and prove that man would not stay dead. God’s original Plan is to have fellowship with man not simply for time on earth but for eternity in Heaven. Man trusts in The Lamb, dies as the lamb died, and the Resurrection of The Lamb, guarantees man will also be resurrected. Those who accept, and trust in The Lamb will rise to be with God forever. Those who reject The Lamb rise and are separated from Him forever.

Scriptures to Read

Exodus 12:3-13

St. Luke 15:1-7

St. Matthew 18:2-14

Isaiah 1:15-25

Isaiah 52:13-53:2

Isaiah 53:3-12

Isaiah 55:6-13