Our subject today is the very
heart of the Gospel, the heart of the Gospel. I'm reading from
the book of Leviticus, chapter 17, verse 11. This is a scripture
that ought to be marked and studied. Leviticus 17, verse 11, it declares,
The life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it, that
is, the blood, to you. upon the altar to make an atonement
for your souls, for it is the blood, for it is the blood that
maketh atonement for the soul. And my friend, if you read the
Word of God, if you read it very much, you're going to encounter
several prominent and persistent subjects. Among them are these. These are the main subjects that
you're going to encounter if you read the Word of God. They're
prominent, persistent subjects. First of all, the attributes
or character of the living God. In the beginning, God. That's
the way the Bible starts. In the beginning, God. God was
in the beginning. All things were made by him and
for his glory. And the scripture says, holy,
holy, holy, Lord God Almighty. He says, I am the Lord, I change
not, immutable. God is eternal in the beginning
God. God is holy. God is unchangeable,
immutable. God is sovereign. He's omnipotent. The Lord ruleth in the armies
of heaven and among the inhabitants of this earth and giveth it to
whomsoever he will. None can stay his hand or say
unto him, what doest thou? The heathen told David, our gods
are in the shrines and temples and altars where we place them.
Where's your God? And David said, our God's in
the heavens. And he earlier said, the heavens of heavens won't
contain him. The earth is his footstool. But
our God is in the heavens. He hath done whatsoever he hath
pleased. Whatsoever the Lord pleased,
that did he in heaven, earth, the seas, and in all deep places. So if you read the Bible, you're
going to encounter prominently the character or attributes of
the living God. And the second thing you're going
to see from Genesis to Revelation, and that is the sinfulness and
depravity of man. The Scripture says there's none
good, no not one. There's none that seeketh after
God. The Lord God looked down from heaven upon the children
of men, to see if there were any that did do good, any that
seek God. He said they all together become
unprofitable. They've all gone out of the way.
He said every imagination of man's heart is only evil continually. The prophet Isaiah wrote, from
the sole of man's feet to the top of his head, there's no soundness
in him. He's nothing but open running
sores that have not been bound up, neither cared for by ointment.
In the flesh, Paul said, dwelleth no good thing. So you're going
to see that all the way through the scripture, the fall of man,
the utter, total, complete ruin by sin of all men. You're going
to see death in men and death about men and death upon men.
Man is a dying creature. All right, the third thing you're
going to see is this. You'll encounter this all the
way through the scripture, and that is the presence and power,
not almighty power, but power of Satan in this world. And in the skies he walketh about
as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. He's subtle, he's
deceptive, he's corrupt and evil, he's the father of lies. You're
going to encounter him. The scripture says we don't wrestle
against flesh and blood. Our warfare is not against flesh
and blood, but against principalities and powers and rulers in the
darkness. He's a subtle creature. He comes
as a minister of light, as an angel of light. He'll change
himself, disguise himself, camouflage himself. He'll use imitation.
He'll use counterfeit. He'll use religion. He'll use
anything in his subtlety to corrupt your mind from the simplicity
of Christ. You're dealing with an arch enemy
and a clever enemy and a powerful enemy, and that is Satan. And
there's no one who can adequately or effectively deal with him
but the Lord God. You're no match for him. You'll
have to turn your battle over to Christ. You'll have to turn
your needs over to him in reference to this enemy of mankind and
enemy of God. He's there. He's there. And then
the fourth thing you're going to run into, and this is the
subject of the Bible. If you take the whole Bible and
compress it and condense it and get one word, that's the essence,
substance, and truth of the whole Bible from Genesis to Revelation,
if you bring it down to one word, It'll be this, Jesus Christ.
He's the message of the Bible, the person and work of Jesus
Christ. The Bible, my friend, is true to science, true science,
God's science, but it's not a book of science. It's true to love,
but it's not a book of love. It's true to history, but it's
not a book of history. The Bible, my friends, is a book
of redemption. The essence of the Scriptures
is Jesus Christ. Moses wrote of me. It's all about
Christ, from Genesis to Revelation, It's a story of how God-loved
sinners chose them in Christ and redeemed them in Christ and
will glorify them in Jesus Christ. There are three things about
Christ that sum up what the Bible says about him. Number one, his
redemptive character. He's the God-man. He was from
the beginning. All things were made for his
glory. He's the God-man. He's the God who became man.
God in human flesh. His redemptive character. His
redemptive work. His life was a perfect life,
an obedient life, a submissive life to God's law and holiness
and righteousness. He is the righteousness of God.
His redemptive work, and that is by life and by death, He redeemed
His people. By His perfect life, He gave
us a perfect righteousness, holiness before the Lord God. And by His
death, He satisfied God's justice. And then His redemptive glory.
It is all for His glory. that no flesh should glory in
his presence. You're going to encounter those
four things, God, his attributes and character, man, his fall
and sinfulness, and Satan, his subtlety and deceptiveness and
power and evil, and the Lord Jesus Christ, his person and
work. But here's my subject today. From Genesis 321 to the last
chapter of Revelation, you're going to encounter B-L-O-O-D,
blood. Blood, the blood of Jesus Christ.
Now, when Adam and Eve sinned in the Garden of Eden, and they
discovered to their shame and to their fear and condemnation
that they were naked, they took fig leaves, huge fig leaves,
and planted them and sewed them together to cover their sin and
their shame. They were embarrassed. They were
fallen creatures. Before, they were without clothes.
They were not embarrassed. They were not ashamed. They didn't
know anything about sin. They didn't know anything about evil.
They didn't know anything about fear. They didn't know anything about
hate. But they tried to cover themselves. And God came and
told them the consequences of their fall, the suffering and
death and sorrow that had come upon them because of their fall.
And then he slew an animal. Now, in slaying that animal,
the animal's blood was shed. That's the first blood ever shed.
That is in actuality. Now, Christ was a lamb slain
in the purpose of God, in the promise of God before the world
began. But this is the first drop of blood that was ever shed.
See, man didn't eat meat in the garden, and no animal died. There
was no such thing as death. But the first death, the first
suffering, this animal suffered, and the first blood, first drop
of blood was shed, and that animal died to cover man's sins. to cover his shame. That's the
first mention of blood there in the Bible. That's the first
example. And it goes all the way through now from there to
the last chapter of Revelation. You have the blood. The blood
was shed that sin might be covered. If it hadn't been for sin, there'd
be no blood shed, no death, no suffering, no sorrow. But the
first drop of blood was to cover man's sin. And all the way through
the Bible, we see our text. It's the blood that maketh atonement
for the soul. Exodus 12, verse 3, God said
to Israel in Egypt, when I see the blood, I'll pass over you.
In Hebrews 9, 22, it says, almost all things under the law were
purged by blood, and without the shedding of blood, there's
no forgiveness, no remission. Whoever, whatever, there's no
remission without the shedding of blood. In 1 Peter 1, 18 and
19, Peter writes, for as much as you know, you know, he's writing
to the church, he's writing to believers, he's writing to those
who know God. He says, you know this. that you were not redeemed
with corruptible things such as silver and gold and works
and deeds and laws and traditions and ceremonies and ordinances
and rituals, but with the precious blood of Christ as a lamb without
blemish and without spot, a lamb without blemish or spot. Verse
John 1, 7, the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, cleanseth
us from all sin. That's the message through the
book. You encounter the blood. If you study the Bible, if you
read God's Word, you're going to read about the blood. You
can't read it without reading about the blood. And my friends,
if I have any apology to make in reference to preaching about
the blood of Christ, and I know today it's thought upon, looked
upon, talked about as a slaughterhouse religion, a first century doctrine,
distasteful, and all of these things people say, but if I have
any apology about preaching about the blood of Jesus Christ, it's
this, that I don't preach it as often as I should. Paul said,
we preach Christ and Him crucified. And the crucifixion was a bloody
scene. It was blood from His hands and
blood from His head and His back and blood from His feet and blood
and water from His side. We preach Christ and Him crucified.
Paul said, God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our
Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me and
unto the world. He said, I'm determined even to the great
city of Corinth. Even to that city of philosophy,
and that city of science, and that city of learning, that city
of arts and culture, he said, I'm determined to know nothing
among you, among you, save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. I warn
the churches and preachers of this day, if you are successful,
as many are attempting to do, if you're successful in removing
the blood of Christ from your hymn And from your sermons, and
from your pulpits, and from your classroom, you have stripped
the gospel of its glory. You have stripped the gospel
of its power, its saving power. You have stripped the gospel
of its effectiveness. For no blood, no remission. No
blood, no forgiveness. No blood atonement, no mercy
seat. No blood atonement, no sacrifice. No blood atonement, no approach
to God. When our Lord Jesus Christ sat
down at the table with his apostles for the last supper before he
went to the cross. He broke the bread in their presence
and he said, this is my body broken for you. Take it and eat
it. And then he took the wine and
he handed it to them in a glass and he said, this is my blood. This is my blood, the blood of
the New Testament, the New Covenant, which is shed for your sins. This is my blood. Drink, eat
all of it. And Paul said, as often as you eat this bread and
drink this cup, you do show the Lord's death until he comes.
There's a fountain filled with blood, drawn from Emmanuel's
veins, and sinners plunge beneath that flood, lose all their guilty
stains. The dying thief rejoiced to see
that fountain in his day. And there may I, though vile
as he, wash all my sins away. Dear dying lamb, thy precious
blood shall Never lose its power till all the ransomed Church
of God be saved to sin no more. Ever since thy faith, I saw that
stream, thy flowing wounds supply. Redeeming love, redeeming blood
has been my theme and shall be till I die. Paul wrote in Ephesians
1, 7, in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness
of sin according to his grace. Now, my friends, there are dozens
of points that we could emphasize in a message on the blood of
Christ. It is the blood that maketh atonement for the soul.
I have given you the blood upon the altar to make an atonement
for your soul. But I want to leave you with
four main thoughts. And I believe if you understand
these four main thoughts, that you will, to some degree, understand
the gospel. You will, to some degree, understand
the redemptive work of Christ. You will to some degree understand
the gospel of saving grace. And you will to some degree know
the living God in his redemptive grace. These four things concerning
the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now the first thing, and this
is true all the way through the word of God, the blood atonement
was always, always, always, without question, always, without exception,
always, before the Lord. Before the Lord. Listen to these
scriptures talking about killing the bullock and killing the lamb
and offering the sacrifice. Kill the lamb, Leviticus 4.4,
kill the lamb before the Lord. Leviticus 4.6, sprinkle the blood
seven times before the Lord. Leviticus 4.7, put the blood
on the horns of the altar before the Lord. Always before the Lord. When that great high priest in
that solemn sacred hour in the tabernacle in the wilderness
When that great high priest took the blood of the lamb and went
into the holy place and then slipped under the veil into the
Holy of Holies, which signified the presence of God, the awesome,
fearful, holy presence of God. There on the mercy seat, the
golden mercy seat covering the Ark of the Covenant, he placed
that blood. There wasn't the eye of any human
being saw it. Not one human eye saw it. He
went in with his incense burning and the smoke filled the place.
And the blood of that lamb was spread over that mercy seat,
which covered the broken law, which was in the art of the covenant.
That atonement was made before the Lord. When Israel was down
in Egypt, God told them to take the blood and put it on the outside
of the door. The people were on the inside.
They were all in the house. The blood was on the outside.
God said, when I see the blood, not when you see it, not when
you keep looking at it, not when you're conscious of it, Your
faith's in me. Your confidence is in me when
I see the blood. Now, I know that most preaching
today presents the death of Christ as an example or presents the
death of Christ as an effort at reformation or perhaps an
offer. And there's no question but the death of Christ is an
example to all of his people. Let this mind be in you which
was in Christ Jesus. We're to follow Christ. We're
to be willing to lay down our lives. But in the Old Testament,
every sin offering and every sacrifice and every atonement,
which were types of Christ, were always before the Lord. Not before
men, not to be seen of men, not to impress men, but they were
always before the Lord. You go and read these references
throughout the Old Testament. The blood was sacrificed, the
blood was sprinkled, and the blood was put on the mercy seat
before the Lord. It was unto the Lord. It was
unto the Lord. Now, what's the second thing?
The blood was before the Lord in reference to us, in reference
to us. It had to do with us. It had
to do with our acceptance to God. It had to do with making
peace toward God for us. It had to do with reconciling
us to God who was angry, whose wrath was upon us, whose judgment
was upon us because of our sins. Romans 3.25, listen. whom God
hath ordained," talking about Christ, Christ hath God foreordained,
to be a mercy seat through faith in his blood, to declare God's
holiness and God's righteousness that God might be just and justify
the ungodly. You see, my friend, the blood
of Christ did not change the nature of God from wrath to love. The blood of Christ didn't change
God's nature from wrath to love. God is love. that Christ died
because God loved us. Listen to John 3, 16. Here's
a favorite and familiar passage of Scripture. For God so loved
the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever
believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. You
see, the love of Christ preceded the death of Christ, preceded
the giving of Christ, preceded the coming of Christ. God loved
us and sent his Son. His love sent his Son. His love
was not caused by his Son coming. It was the reason why his Son
came. His Son came as a result of his love. You see, the law
of God has a claim on every man. What the law saith, it saith
to them who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped,
and all the world become guilty before God. And that holy law
of God must be honored. It must be honored. God cannot
save a man or receive a man or accept a man at the expense of
his holiness and his righteousness and the truth of his law. And
his justices must be satisfied. The soul that sinneth must shall
surely die. The wages of sin is death. So
Jesus Christ came before the Lord as a sin offering, atonement
and sacrifice in reference to us for our acceptance. The publican in the temple who
smote upon his breast, and cried, God, be merciful to me, a sinner.
Do you know what all of the old scholars say that he was, what
he was saying or laying claim to? He was looking back to that
blood on the altar, on the mercy seat, and he was saying this,
Lord, be propitiated to me. Let thy blood be propitiation,
be merciful, for they all knew the only way God could be merciful
is if God could be propitiated, God could be reconciled. God's
law could be honored and his justice satisfied. Be thou propitiation
to me through the blood. And our Lord, once again, the
Lord's table. When our Lord distributed the broken bread and the wine,
he said, this is my body, broken, my bloodshed, drink ye all of
it. And Paul later said to the church, now let a man examine
himself and so let him eat. Examine himself for what? To
see if he's perfectly holy? No, we know we're not. To see
if he's worthy to take the Lord's table. We're not worthy. Never
will be worthy. To see if he discerns the Lord's
broken body and shed blood. You know what the word discern
means? It means to understand. It means to judge. It means to
see. Do you understand the blood of
Christ and the body of Christ, the broken body of Christ? If
you understand it, if you judge or discern or see what it's all
about, that Christ's body was broken and his blood was shed,
that God's justice might be honored, that God's justice might be satisfied.
The blood was before the Lord. The sacrifice of Christ was not
toward men, not as just an example for men or not to impress men. It was before the Lord. It was
before the Lord to satisfy his justice, to satisfy his righteousness. A criminal is never turned loose
till his debt's paid. A man is never released justified
from prison till he served his sentence. And you and I, sinners,
criminals in God's kingdom, are not going to be released. We're
not going to be justified. We're not going to be accepted
of God, for our debt's paid. So the law's been honored and
satisfied, and that's what Christ did in reference to us. Now notice
this about the blood. The blood before the Lord was
in reference to us. And it gives power and efficacy,
efficacy to the intercession of Christ. Now then, there's
one God. First Timothy 2.5 says this,
there's one God and there's one Mediator between God and men. Mediator is an advocate, intercessor,
one who pleads the cause of another. There's one Mediator. Now, my
friend, you better learn this. It doesn't matter whether you're
Baptist, Methodist, Catholic or what you are, you better learn
this. The Word of God plainly says there's one God and one
Mediator between God and men, and that's the man Christ Jesus.
is one who can deal with both sides. And Jesus Christ is the
only Mediator. He is God, and He became a man
identified with us. But a Mediator has to have something
to plead. A Mediator has to have something
to offer. He has to have bargaining power.
He has to meet the law's demands and justice claims. When the
Lord Jesus Christ goes before the Father on behalf of His people,
on behalf of sinners, He's got to have something to present,
something to plead. What does he present and what
does he plead? He pleads his blood. Listen to this, Hebrews
9, 12. By his own blood, he entered in once into the holy place,
not made with hands like on the earth, which are the figures
of the truth, but into heaven itself. Once in the end of the
world hath he appeared and entered heaven, the holy place, with
his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption. And my friends,
the very fact that Christ had blood, the very fact that Christ
had blood shows he was identified with us. He had to be a man to
have blood. God became a man. And that shows his identification
with us. He was numbered with the transgressors. He became
a man. So my mediator or my advocate with the Father is also the man,
Christ Jesus, who had blood. Paul told the elders at Ephesus
there, Corinth, Antioch, wherever they were, he said, you feed
the church of God, which was purchased with his own blood.
He had blood. That shows he was identified
with us. The fact that it's the blood of God's Son, the fact
that it was the blood of God's Son gives his blood infinite
value. You say, there's so many sinners.
There's so many sins. There's only one Savior, only
one mediator. Who is that Mediator? Who is
that Savior? It's the Son of God. It's God
Himself. He has infinite power, infinite efficacy, infinite sufficiency. He's able to save to the uttermost
all that come to God by Him. The blood of Jesus Christ is
able to cleanse us from all sin because of who He is. Are you
learning? The fact that His blood was promised
and prophesied and pictured and typified throughout the Scriptures
gives me assurance to trust him. Under the blood of Jesus, safe
in the shepherd's fold. Under the blood of Jesus, I'm
safe while the ages roll, safe though the worlds may crumble,
safe though the stars grow dim. Under the blood of Jesus, we're
secure in him. The fact that he had blood identifies
him with me. The efficacy and infinite value
of his blood because he's God's son and he's the mediator. He brings me to God and reconciles
all who believe. And then the fourth thing, the
blood of Christ before the Lord gives acceptance to my worship. Listen to Hebrews 10, 19. Having
therefore, brethren, boldness ourselves, you and me, people,
to enter into the holiest. You mean into the presence of
God? Yes, sir. You mean into the direct throne
room of God? Yes, sir. You mean I don't have
to send somebody else in my place? No more. The veil in the temples
rent entwined. Come ye sinners poor and needy,
weak and wounded by the fall. Come to Christ. Come into the
throne of God. Come before the presence of the
Lord. How? By the blood of Jesus. Hebrews 10, 19. Having a high
priest over the house of God, let us draw near with full assurance. We'll be accepted in the blood
of Christ and only in the blood of Christ. My friends, there's
so much flesh in all that we are and so much sin in all that
we do. And so faint the best praise
and so wandering the best prayer, we need the cleansing, redeeming,
atoning, sanctifying blood of the Lord Jesus Christ at all
times. Having a high priest over the
house of God who has opened for us into his presence by his blood
a new and living way, let us come. And remember this, our
worship is accepted, is accepted in proportion as it is offered
in the blood of Christ. Precious blood. What can wash
away my sins? Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
What can make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus.