Series on "The Message of the Cross" – (7)
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 16889 |
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February 19, 2006 |
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 Rev. Dr. Jaerock Lee
Why Is Jesus Our Savior?
- The Path of Salvation for Mankind According to the Law on the Redemption of the Land -
"Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature; a wisdom, however, not of this age nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away; but we speak God's wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory"
(1 Corinthians 2:6-7).
When Christians tell people who are unaware of God's love that only Jesus Christ is the Savior and that we cannot receive salvation through anyone else, the latter group is either puzzled or accuses Christianity of being "self-righteous." Therefore, it is crucial for us to understand distinctly why Jesus Christ is our only Savior and make every effort to preach the gospel to all people.
{The Order of Publication}
Why Is Jesus our Savior?
1.The Path of Salvation for Mankind According to the Law on the Redemption of the Land
2.Qualifications for the Savior (1)
3.Qualifications for the Savior (2)
1.Adam Heads Down the Path of Death
Without experiencing misfortune and distress, people cannot appreciate happiness. Only when people suffer from grief and affliction can they understand the value of true happiness and be grateful for it from the heart.
So that man would come to recognize this relativity, God placed the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and barred Adam from eating from it because eating the tree's fruit was to give him death. God also gave Adam free will by which he could make decisions on his own and eventually, Adam ended up forsaking God's commandment and eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Some may ask, "How could Adam sin if there was no evil in him?" Keep in mind, however, that Adam did not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil because there was some evil in his heart. By eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in his free will, evil was formed in Adam's heart and he came to know evil. Observing the process in which people today become drenched in sin and evil will help us understand the process in which evil entered Adam.
For instance, a child who constantly hits other children was not like that from the start. Of course, he had within him sinful attributes due to the original sin with which he was born. Until he developed that evil habit of hitting other children, however, there was a process in which the child accepted the evil practice. At first, he would have seen people striking others, then repeated it himself once or twice, and become someone who habitually hits other people.
In his free will, Adam ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil after falling into the serpent's temptation. As God had warned him, "You shall surely die," the spirit – the master of man – died. Adam was since cut off from communication with God while he – and all his descendants – became slaves to the enemy devil and Satan.
As we find in Romans 6:16, "Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone [as] slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness?" by his obedience to sin, Adam became a slave to the enemy devil, the governor of darkness.
At that time, Adam had to relinquish the authority and glory he had been given as the ruler of all creatures (Genesis 1:28) to the enemy devil, who told Jesus in Luke 4:6, "I will give You all this domain and its glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to whomever I wish."
After receiving from Adam the authority to govern and rule over all creatures in the universe, the devil has since tainted the world with increasing sin and evil, and with the passing of time the heart of man has grown more evil. The enemy devil also brings disease, poverty, disaster, tears, grief, and torment, to people and will end up taking them to hell, the realm of eternal death.
Yet, the Providence of God the creator of man lies not in the fall of man into hell but leading him to experience the relativity in this world, be well cultivated, and in the end, the everlasting heaven.
As God knew in advance that Adam would eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil from the moment He planned human cultivation, He prepared the path of salvation for the sinful mankind and that path is Jesus Christ.
2.The Path of Salvation for Mankind and the Law on the Redemption of the Land
How, then, could the sinful mankind reach salvation? God does and carries everything out in His love and justice. For God does everything within the boundary of the spiritual law and order, His forgiveness and salvation of sinners are also carried out in His perfect justice.
Therefore, in order for the salvation of the sinful mankind to be achieved, Jesus had to redeem us from our sins by taking up the cross and dying on it. According to the spiritual law that dictates, "The wages of sin is death," Jesus had to pay the wages of our sin on our behalf by taking up the cross and receiving the punishment of death.
Anyone who believes this and accepts Jesus Christ as his Savior is able to receive salvation and enter heaven. For that person will have come to believe in the work of the blood of Jesus Christ, accepted the Lord, and become a child of God, he can begin living in blessings and the enemy devil can no longer rule over him.
People who do not believe in this fact, however, always ask, "Why do we receive salvation only when we believe in Jesus Christ?" Yet, as the Bible tells us in Acts 4:12, "And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men, by which we must be saved," no one except for Jesus can be the Savior and no one can receive salvation without accepting Him as his Savior.
Why can only Jesus be our Savior? This is because of the spiritual law. All mankind was destined to death because of Adam's sin according to the spiritual law, "The wages of sin is death." When all men became slaves to the enemy devil and Satan, the spiritual law, "When you present yourselves to someone [as] slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey," was applied.
According to which provision of the spiritual law can the sinful mankind receive forgiveness and salvation? We can find the answer to this question in "the law on the redemption of the land" from the Bible.
Leviticus 25:23-25 tell us, "The land, moreover, shall not be sold permanently, for the land is Mine; for you are [but] aliens and sojourners with Me. Thus for every piece of your property, you are to provide for the redemption of the land. If a fellow countryman of yours becomes so poor he has to sell part of his property, then his nearest kinsman is to come and buy back what his relative has sold."
This provision of the law was established with regard to transactions of the land in Israel and it is also applied to man, who is formed of dust of the ground.
God divided and distributed the land of Canaan according to each tribe and family of Israel and since all the land essentially belonged to God, man could not sell it at will.
If the owner of the land became poor and was forced to sell the land, his nearest kinsman was to buy back and return the land to the owner. Embedded in this law on the redemption of the land is the path of salvation for the sinful mankind. This is because the law on selling and buying back of the land is related and applied directly to man who himself has been formed of dust of the ground.
In Genesis 3:19, God tells Adam, "By the sweat of your face You shall eat bread, Till you return to the ground, Because from it you were taken; For you are dust, And to dust you shall return." In Genesis 3:23 we read, "[therefore] the LORD God sent him out from the garden of Eden, to cultivate the ground from which he was taken."
The law on the redemption of the land has a direct relationship with the way in which man, who was taken from the ground and handed over to the hands of the enemy devil, can be returned to God. Just as the land belongs to God, He has stipulated that Adam's authority – which in essence belongs to Him – could not be "sold permanently."
This was the law agreed upon both by God and the enemy devil at the time Adam, who was of God, sinned and was turned over to the enemy devil. Thus, even if Adam became a slave to the enemy devil and was forced to relinquish all his authority, at the appearing of an individual who could satisfy the law on the redemption of the land, the enemy devil had to return what was "handed over" to him.
As God knew in advance that Adam would eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, He prepared the Savior who would satisfy all the provisions of the law on the redemption of the land, and that Savior is Jesus Christ. What are the qualifications to be satisfied by the Savior? I will continue in the next issue of Manmin Joong-ang News.
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
May each of you give thanks and glory to God for opening the path to salvation for the sinful mankind with the law on the redemption of the land, and lead a powerful life in Christ with greater reliance on Him, in the name of Our Lord I bless!
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