The Work of Jesus Christ

The Work of Christ

Part 1 On the Cross

When Jesus had spoken these things, He raised His eyes to heaven [in prayer] and said, “Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your Son, so that Your Son may glorify You.  Just as You have given Him power and authority over all mankind, so that He may give eternal life to all whom You have given.  Now this is eternal life: that they may know You, the only true [supreme and sovereign] God, Jesus Christ whom You have sent.  I have glorified You [down here] on the earth by completing the work that You gave Me to do. John 17:1-4

The work of Christ on the cross is in a single word, Salvation. Because of the love of God toward the world Christ had to die on the cross. The scripture says “ For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son..”(John 3:16) However Before we go any further on the work of Jesus Christ on the cross, let us not devalue his death by saying or teaching that God’s love is the reason for salvation. It is so much more than that. You see the scriptures teaches that God is just and what this means is God will without prejudice judge us according to our transgressions. This is very important and extremely scary because we are taught that the wage(s) of sin is death, (Romans 6:23) and all of us have fallen short of God’s requirement. (Romans 3:23). Everyone deserves eternal damnation, without exception.

It was to demonstrate His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the One who justifies those who have faith in Jesus [and rely confidently on Him as Savior]. Romans 3:26

But God is also merciful, and so knowing that none could attain eternal life on our own merit, provided a way for us to be reconciled back to Him and meet his perfect standards. This was done by providing a substitute that would die for us. Someone that had not sinned himself so had no sin payment owed for himself. Yet every man has sinned, so God sent his Son, Jesus Christ to make a substitute payment for our sin.

This is very much like a parent would pay for the repair of a window that his/her child had broken playing softball. The parent did not break the window, the child did. Yet it is the parent who makes the payment to propitiate the anger of the owner toward the child. When the parent pays for the repair the owner of the house no longer has any wrath against the child and treats the child as if his transgression had never happened.

Likewise, when Jesus died on the cross as a substitute for us, His blood propitiated the wrath of God against us. This was so that God can be just (in the punishment of sin) and justifier (dealing with us as though he had never transgressed against him) of those that have faith in Jesus Christ. 

This is salvation as it relates to the cross should be understood through four important and seldom taught words. These four words explain the work of Christ on the cross, and we should understand that work not so much as what was done to Christ Jesus; Rather it should be understood as what was done for us. Many times Christ proclaimed that for this reason (the cross) he came into this world. (John 18:11) Every Christian should know these words, their meaning and how to rightly articulate their meaning to others.

1.      Substitution; This means that Jesus Christ died on the cross instead of us; not for us as one person would do a favor for another as it is often taught. We should rightly understand that Jesus Christ died on the cross, the death that we rightly deserved to die.  Isaiah 53:5 says “He was bruised for our transgressions, wounded for our iniquities…”  never once do we read anywhere in the Bible, anything about His transgressions, or His iniquities, His death was a direct result of what we did, and are still doing, our sins, our hate, our lust, our greed.  1 Peter  2:24 reminds us that it was our sins that were chastised (punished) on the cross, and it was Jesus that received our punishment.

2.      Propitiation – The death of Christ on the cross satisfies completely God’s righteous demands. The wrath of God (his righteous Judgement) because our sin is appeased in the punishment that was given to Jesus Christ.  So then propitiation is that which satisfies the wrath God.  If we read Isaiah 53:5 a second time we  can see the propitiation through the parenthetical statements included. Notice it reads

“upon him (Jesus Christ) the chastisement that brought us peace, (with God) and with his wounds (which caused his death) we are healed (from the disease of sin). Isaiah 53:5

Likewise 1 John 2:2 says he was ( his death) was the propitiation of our sins. His death paid the wages of sin (Romans 6:23) and finally Romans 3:25 gives the requirement for Jesus to be a propitiation for you and me individually, faith in the blood of Jesus Christ.   

3.      Redemption – Christ’s death on the cross redeemed us from sin. Redemption is the act of taking possession of something in exchange for payment or clearing of debt. In ancient times a person that could not pay his debt would be put into slavery.   And if a family member or friend had the resources, he could redeem that person out of slavery by paying the debt.  The redemption was the overall action, but the paying of money was called the ransom.  When we think of ransom, we think of the money paid to kidnappers for the release of a loved one.

The Bible teaches that Christ’s death on the cross purchased and set free by a ransom price (his blood) those who are enslaved to sin. 1Timothy 2:5-6 says Jesus gave himself as a ransom and Ephesians 1:7 says in Him we have redemption for the forgiveness of sin

4.   Reconciliation – Christ’s death on the cross removes the state of hostility between God and man so that peace may be established.  There are two words we must understand the meaning to here. The first is reconcile, it means to restore friendly relations with, to allow to coexist in harmony.

The second word is an atonement, we will address this word again, but concerning the work of Christ on the cross, we should think of atonement as the mending of a broken fence. To get an idea of it meaning consider slavery in the United States. Whereas the Emancipation Proclamation reconciled the relationship between the slave and the slave owner, it did nothing to fix the hurt or the wrong that had been instigated against the slaves for hundreds of years. In fact, today many college students and civil right advocates speak of a reparation, which can be either some type of financial, or educational, of material payment, to even the playing field of African Americans because of the unfair advantage that they will have to overcome. So, then the atonement is the making right a situation that was previously wrong.

“For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God (had a friendly relationship restored with God) by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. ¹¹ And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement. (Jesus Christ has made what was wrong right by his death on the cross)” Romans 5:10-11(KJV)[1]

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[1] You may notice that Romans 5:10-11 uses the word reconciliation in both verses but never uses the word atonement. This is a problem in the translation and one the reason I use the King James Bible. If you go to strong concordance you will see that reconciliation in verse 10 is used only the first time.