Hi and welcome to the Via Zion Sermon podcast.
We are a local church based here in Chennai, India.
We are so glad you are with us and hope that this will
encourage, inspire and instill fresh faith in you.
Our theme for the year 2024 is set apart and today on Good
Friday we look at how the blood of Jesus has set us apart.
As you listen in, would you ask God to teach you how to live
with a better understanding of His blood, its power, and
covering over your life? Hi church, what a amazing day it
is to celebrate the goodness of God.
We we look at Good Friday through the lens of Jesus and it
changes everything because it truly is a Good Friday.
We have a good Father who sent His perfect son who was a
sacrifice for you and me. And the good news is that
because of what Jesus did on that cross, you and I Can Walk
and freedom and newness of life. I was reading this story this
week and I thought I should share it with you.
This person writes about how he had a herd of sheep, and one of
his sheep one morning when he went to check on them, found
that it's face was completely swollen and the sheep looked
like it was in terrible pain. When he examined the sheep, he
found that the sheep had been bitten by a rattlesnake, which
was very common in that parts of the country.
He was The shepherd was a bit worried for his sheep, but the
sheep didn't look perturbed by it at all.
The rattlesnake didn't know that the sheep's blood could actually
handle its venom. So although the sheep, for
better part of two days, was swollen up and in a lot of pain,
it kept doing its usual things. It was wandering around.
It was, you know, looking for pasture and doing all of the
usual things. The truth is that apparently
antidotes for snake venom are raised in sheep.
The rattlesnake didn't know that, so this sheep was actually
having blood that could override the venom of the rattlesnake.
If you have been living fearful of the serpent or his bite, I
want to remind you of this, that be sure that the lamb's blood
flows in your vein veins. What was shed on that cross of
Calvary now today flows in our veins.
We don't have to live afraid anymore.
When Jesus died on that cross, he took once and for all and
paid the penalty for our sins. Today, because of that blood
that runs through our veins that is washed over us, we can live
free from the power of sin. And one day in eternity where we
will live with the Father, with the Son, we will see that we
will be free from the presence of sin as we get into today's
Scripture. I was looking at the book of
John, and I love this one passage where John the Baptist,
when he sees his cousin Jesus walking in into the town that he
was in, He had a very weird way of introducing his cousin to the
people around him. He says, look, here's the Lamb
of God, the one that takes away the sins of the world.
But John had spiritized to see what Jesus was going to
accomplish. He knew that his cousin was
going to do something that no one else could ever do.
And so I want to ask you this. Have you ever felt that the only
tough part of you know, being a believer, being a believer in
Jesus, the follower of Jesus, is admitting just how sinful we
are. We needed a lamb who would take
away the sins of the world because we ourselves are so
sinful. We needed the lamb who would
take our sins upon himself. Sometimes it's easier to look at
someone else and say they are so sinful or they're doing
something. Or we look at the crimes that
are happening in our countries and we look at those people and
think, well, what a sinful person.
But to come back to ourselves and to remember that I am so
sinful and that's why Jesus died for me, I continue to grapple
with sin. I'm not no longer a slave to it.
I now have power over it. But it doesn't change the fact
that we are sinful. We are sinners that were saved
by grace and we we are sinners who are continually in need of
that grace. It's a saving grace that it
happens every day. That's the renewing work of the
Holy Spirit. So before we go further, I want
to just first look at the power of the blood.
We're going to be looking at a lot of scripture today, so I
would urge you to keep your Bibles open.
We're going to begin with Hebrews Chapter 9.
We're going to be reading about the power of the blood for you
to understand, actually in its entirety.
Why are we focusing on the blood?
I thought today was today was about the cross, but I want to
just encourage you. It's about the cross.
But from the cross float the blood of Jesus, which for you
and me was our redemption. So I want us to look at Hebrews
Chapter 9 verses 12 to 15. This is what it says.
With his own blood, not the blood of goats and calves, He
entered the Most Holy Place once for all time and secured our
redemption forever. Under the old system, the blood
of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer could cleanse
people's bodies from ceremonial impurity.
Just think how much more the blood of Christ will purify our
consciences from sinful deeds so that we can worship the living
God. For by the power of the eternal
Spirit, Christ offered Himself to God as a perfect sacrifice
for us sins. That is why He is the one who
mediates a new the covenant between God and people, so that
all who are called can receive the eternal inheritance God has
promised them. For Christ died to set them free
from the penalty of the sins they had committed under that
first covenant. The first thing that we looked
at look at in terms of the power of the blood is it It wipes our
sins clean, and therefore it sets us free from the penalty of
sin. When you go to a store and you
see an outfit, there's always something attached to it, and
that's that, the price tag. All our sins have a price tag to
it. You commit adultery, there's a
price tag. You lose your marriage or you
you are distant from God. Maybe you have an addiction to a
certain substance, but there's a price tag attached to that sin.
Maybe it's an anger problem. Again, there's a price tag to
that sin where you antagonize and hurt people.
All our sin has a price tag. But the beautiful thing is that
in Jesus, the sin itself is wiped clean.
So there's nothing to hold the tag on to now.
And so there's no longer a penalty for it.
And so we are set free from the penalty of sin.
Isn't that amazing? Hebrews chapter 10, verses 19 to
22, it says. And so, dear brothers and
sisters, we can boldly enter heaven's most holy place because
of the blood of Jesus. By his death, Jesus opened a new
and living way, giving through the curtain, giving way through
the curtain into the most holy place.
And since we have a great high priest who rules over God's
house, let us go right into the presence of God with sincere
hearts, fully trusting him. For our guilty consciences have
been sprinkled with Christ's blood to make us clean, and our
blood bodies have been washed with pure water.
Picture a dark room with heavy sun blocking curtains.
You know you have those these kind of curtains now just so
heavy that cuts all the light out.
Israel and the rest of the world was literally in a darkened room
when Jesus died on that cross, when the blood flowed from his
broken body. It says that he made a way to
the presence of God himself. The curtain in the temple was
torn into two right from the top, right down to the bottom of
the curtains. And the blood therefore opens a
way to God and brings us into his presence.
Up until then, the high priests had to do all of this work of
mediation. They had to offer the
sacrifices. And then people could actually,
you know, present their, you know, Thanksgiving to God or
their offerings to God. But now, in this beautiful turn
of events, the blood opened up the curtains.
And you know what? When you open a blocked room, a
light blocked room. Have you seen how the sunlight
just pours into the room? It lights up every crevice, but
it was no difference spiritually that that day.
On on that Friday afternoon when Jesus's blood flowed, the way to
the Father was open. No longer with priests needed as
mediators. No longer did they have to look
to any other means to have access to God.
They had direct access to the you and I have direct access
because of the blood. Let's look now at Hebrews
chapter 12 verses 22 to 24. It says.
But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living
God, this heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable company of
angels, to the General Assembly and Church of the first born who
are registered in heaven. To God the judge of all, to the
spirits of just just men made perfect.
To Jesus, the mediator of the New Covenant, and to the blood
of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel.
If you remember the story of Cain and Abel, Cain turns to his
brother in the field after his sacrifice was not accepted and
in a fit of rage kills Abel. When God confronts Cain, he
asked, Where's your brother? He asked.
Am I my brother's keeper? He says your brother's blood
cries out to me from the ground, which opened up to receive it.
And and So what Abel's blood was probably screaming for was for
justice, for recompense. But today he says the blood of
Jesus speaks a better thing. What does it speak?
The blood of Jesus speaks mercy over punishment.
It speaks forgiveness over condemnation.
Isn't that amazing? The blood of Jesus speaks a
better thing and brings restoration.
In the Old Covenant, the blood didn't speak restoration
necessarily. But here in the New Covenant,
when this blood was being poured out, it spoke restoration, it
spoke peace, it spoke love, It spoke volumes of grace.
The blood speaks over us. So the main thing that you need
to remember in terms of the power of the blood is it wipes
our slates clean, No more sin. It wipes our sins away.
It removes the penalty of sin. It opens the way to God himself
and leads us into His presence presence directly.
And thirdly, it speaks and brings restoration.
Isn't that amazing? The blood of Abel, it didn't
speak restoration. It's it's screamed for justice.
But today the blood of Jesus speaks forgiveness, speaks
mercy, and I want to encourage us to think of this in a new
way. When you look at the blood of
Jesus, I want you to remember the theme for this year at V as
I and the theme for this year is set apart.
Right? But God has marked us for His
own He set us apart. But I want to bring our
attention to Hebrews chapter 10, verse 10.
And this is what it says. And in accordance with this will
of God, we who believe in the message of salvation have been
sanctified, that is set apart as holy for God and His purposes
through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ, the Messiah,
the anointed. Once for all, we have been
sanctified, set apart as holy for God and His purposes.
How? By the blood of Jesus.
So the call on us today is to a holy separation.
You and I, we live in the real world.
We have real jobs. We meet with the real people.
So what does this look like? He's calling us to being set
apart. No longer is it an option.
It's a command. Because we were bought at such a
high price, it was not ordinary that someone would die for us in
such a gruesome way, give their life for us so that their blood
ran and washed me clean. I have no other response except
to being set apart. Why are we finding it so hard to
be set apart? Far from the madding crowd?
We want to hang out with people. We want to merge in.
We want to fit in. We're so desperate from the time
of little children in kindergarten, You know, some of
us are trying to fit in when God distinctly called us to be set
apart. How can we have the incessant
desire to fit in when his blood has marked us and set us apart?
Those are things we need to consider for ourselves.
What does it look like to be actually set apart, to have a
holy separation? I want us to look at Hebrews
chapter 13 verses 10 to 13. It says we have an altar from
which those who serve the Tabernacle, the sacred tent,
have no right to eat. For the bodies of those animals
whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest as
an offering for sin, are burned outside the camp.
Therefore Jesus also suffered and died outside the city gate,
so that he might sanctify and set apart for God as holy the
people who believe through the shedding of his own blood.
So let us go outside to him, outside the camp, bearing his
contempt, the disgrace and shame that he had to suffer.
When you look at this, it gives us a clear picture of what it
looks like for us today to be set apart.
Jesus suffered on all you know, that route of Via della Rossa
and right up to the hill of the sky, Golgotha, where he was
bruised, beaten, made to carry his own cross up.
And then, when they fixed him on the cross and hung him, he hung
there for the better part of a couple of hours.
He suffered outside the gates of Jerusalem.
He was removed from his place of birth.
From his origins he was taken separately.
He was separated and isolated he was and this this particular
hill would stand out so that people from a long distance away
could actually see him. He was made a spectacular.
He was despised and and afflicted and pointed at and
laughed and mocked. So many of us have a problem
with people disliking us. We have a a a constant need to
please people. I'm one such person.
It offends me that I've offended someone else.
It hurts that someone would treat me bad, and I didn't
deserve it when I didn't do anything that deserved it, when
they rightly deserved something and yet they looked at me like
the problem. It's awesome.
But when you read this, it brings us into a sharp focus of
what God expects from us. That when his blood has washed
us, it sets us apart. And there will be times when you
take a stand for Jesus in your work spot, in your family, in
your home, in your neighborhood, wherever you go.
Maybe when you're travelling, when you take a stand for Jesus,
it will cause reproach to fall upon you.
You will be name called, You will be called out.
You will be mocked. Will you be willing to bear it
for Jesus? If Jesus could do it, would I be
willing to join him outside the camp?
The camps are many. We look at school kids, they
have those tight cliques and a new kid who joins and God forbid
they don't know which group will fit them in.
Sometimes when they when kids join a school late, they just
fit themselves to the group that's seated closest to them
and then they find within a few weeks they don't fit in at all.
Wherever your camp, wherever you have set up camp, It could be at
office with a group of people. It could be in your apartment.
It could be in your society. It could be anywhere.
Will you take a stand for Jesus? That could even mean
excommunication from that camp. It might mean a season of
loneliness. It might mean a season when you
don't have many people to process things with.
It might mean a season when you need to go deep with God and let
go of certain relationships. But will you do it because Jesus
suffered outside the camp? Will I be willing to go to him,
the writers actually asking us. So let us go to him outside the
camp, bearing his contempt. Too many of us are avoiding the
contempt of people by saying all the right things, by agreeing
with the culture, with agreeing with New Age philosophies, by
appropriating those into our lives.
God's calling you to a holy separation.
What does it look like to separate ourselves practically?
You may say. Well, that was Jesus.
He knew his assignment. He knew right from the beginning
that he was going to suffer outside.
He knew that he was going to be set apart and pulled out and
made fun of. He knew that he signed up for
that. I don't know if I could do it.
I'm a man. I'm a woman.
Let's look at the example of Moses.
Hebrews Chapter 11 verses 24 to 28.
It says by faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be
called the son of Pharaoh's daughter because he preferred to
endure the hardship of the people of God rather than to
enjoy the passing pleasures of sin.
He considered the reproach of Christ, that is the rebuke he
would suffer for his faithful obedience to God to be greater
wealth than all the treasures of Egypt.
For he looked ahead to the reward promised by God.
By faith he left Egypt, being unafraid of the wrath of the
king, for he endured steadfastly as seeing him who is unseen.
By faith, he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of the blood
on the doorposts, so that the destroyer of the first born
would not touch them. The first born of Israel, Moses
was born to his to an ordinary Jewish family.
But his family, even in that it says by faith, Moses's parents
saw that he was a beautiful special child and they kept him
hidden for three months. And I think that faith was just
carried on intrinsically towards Moses as well.
And so Moses carried that he knew he didn't belong in the
Egyptian household. He knew who he belonged to.
And so it says that he he preferred to endure the hardship
of the people of God rather than the the pleasures of the
Egyptian palace. He considered the reproach of
Christ to be greater than the treasures of Egypt.
It's interesting that by faith he left Egypt.
He didn't worry about the wrath of the king.
He had to run for his life of course.
But he left. And eventually it says by faith
he kept the Passover. Another, the word that is
repeating there is by faith. By faith, it was just an act of
obedience to an unseen God. He couldn't see this God of of
his forefathers in person, but he knew he was speaking to
someone real. He knew he was encountering a
real God and he was taking him at his word.
And the beautiful thing is, he chose again and again to be in
the camp of God himself. He could have chosen many times
along the journey God would say, you move aside, I'm going to
destroy the Israelites and he would stand in the gap and say
don't do that Lord. It's for your name's sake.
It would look like you couldn't bring them out safe.
So please, Lord, hold off. He kept choosing the assignment
that God had placed on. He kept choosing the Jesus camp.
He kept choosing the hardships of following his God, even
though they were easier options at the time.
He could have turned a blind eye to his suffering people, to his
suffering kin and kit. He could have looked away and
said this is not my problem, I don't know how to do this.
I have no background in this. I don't know social justice, I
have not studied and I don't have a degree in this.
I don't have the resources. I'm just an adoptive son.
Instead, he decided to step out. He stepped out of the camp of
comfort. He stepped out of the camp of
being recognized and being honoured into a place of
dishonour, into a place of obscurity, and he trusted the
God who had called him. Will you be OK to suffer for
Jesus to have a hard life just because you've said yes to him
and no to the world? Will you keep your eyes fixed on
an invisible God? For those of you who come from
families that don't know Jesus, they must find it very funny
that you would worship someone without a picture, without an
altar, without any kind of, you know, form.
But the beautiful thing is that our God may not have all of
that, but he's real. He's as real as the breath in
our bodies, and he's doing things that no man can even
understand. His ways are higher, his
thoughts are higher. I love that we are in a season
as a church where a lot of things that God had spoken to us
a couple of years back are coming into fruition.
And so it's amazing for those of us who have been praying to
actually see God's word unfold. We're in a season where he spoke
before, but now he's doing it. And so you're starting to see
the dots join. And without a doubt, we know he
is real. He's so real.
And so will you choose to again and again pursue this God who
others can't see but you know is with you?
Will you choose the Jesus camp? That's the question.
Will you choose? The Jesus camp is not with the
crowds. It's set apart.
It's being outside. It's a little isolated, but you
have an incredible community there with him.
It requires that you will be ready to give up everything that
he asks you to give up. I love that When you read the
Old Testament, you look at the depths of the sacrificial
system. And you know, I've often thought
when I was read, when I read Leviticus, when I read numbers,
I I feel exhausted just reading the content because it feels so
exhaustive. It feels so.
It's tiring to have known these things as a community by heart
and then to do the right thing. Also, this is this week.
I need to do the grain offering. I need to do the burnt offering.
We need to do the trespass offering.
You know, there were so many things that they had to process,
figure out and do it right. And I think God insisted on that
so that there was a certain focus that the people had when
it came to worship because they were so easily turned aside by a
golden calf. They needed their eyes to be
fixed, and in these ritualistic offerings, their hearts, hands,
and mind would be fixed on actually worshipping God with
all that they had. It would keep them far from
idolatry because they would be so caught up in what they needed
to do. And the sacrificial system
actually began way before Leviticus, when Adam and Eve
sinned. God himself provided leather
garments from slain animals to clothe them with so that they
will not make it anymore. It didn't end there.
Then Noah, after the flood and when the earth was starting to
be, you know, reformed, so to speak, with, you know, new trees
and all of that coming back up. And the animals from the ark
were going out to populate the earth.
It says that Noah took a couple of those clean birds and he
actually offered it as a sweet smelling offering to God.
And it says that when God smelt that sweet offering, he decided
he will never destroy the earth by a flood again.
Following that, Abraham on multiple occasions built altars
and so did his sons, and they built altars.
They would worship at the offered burnt offerings.
So the sacrificial system then took shape, and you know, it
became really concrete with Moses when Moses actually gave
instructions on how the Tabernacle had to be built and
how everything had to be set up and how they had to institute
the concept of the blood sacrifice so that things would
be sanctified. The whole every item in the
Tabernacle was sprinkled with blood and the animals were
slain. And the priests would be so
involved in killing these bulls, or the calves, the heifers, the
sheep, and offering them to God. There were strict rules on how
it had to be done, and only the priest could do it.
But every single thing that you looked at, you saw that there
was so much of meaning, deeper meaning, there was so much of
symbolism in what they were doing in the old Covenant.
If you notice Hebrew chapter, Hebrews Chapter 11, verse 28, By
faith he kept the Passover. This is Moses and the sprinkling
of blood lest he who destroyed the first born should touch
them. Like I was saying, the blood has
such huge relevance. God gave an instruction to the
people. When you eat animals don't eat
the blood because the life of the animal is in the blood.
And yet at the Passover, just before they left Egypt on their
exodus, God says I want you to kill a goat.
Take his soap, which is a kind of a herb herbaceous plant.
Dip it in the blood and then smear it on your doorposts right
now. How did Moses know that this was
something he had to do? He trusted God.
God told him do this. It will protect your homes.
Because I'm going to send a destroyer who is going to
destroy every first born. If you want your people to be
safe, if you want your people to be set apart, you need to do
this. And Moses intrinsically knew
that he had to do what was being told to him.
This would be the beginning of a lot of instructions that God was
going to give him. And so he obeyed and told them
that in every single Israelite family obeyed.
And I love if you watched The Prince of Egypt, it's a cartoon
animation of of the story of Moses and the people of Israel.
And I love the way they showed that that particular scene that
night everyone is locked into their homes and this dark figure
descends from the sky and starts to visit the houses.
And every time the figure came near one of the Israelite
houses, one of the Jewish homes, they had the blood marked on the
door post. It would look at.
It was just like a big cloud that came down a dark cloud.
It would visit that it cannot enter the house because of the
blood and it would swerve and go to the next place.
But the same dark creature would went into Egypt and caused havoc
in every family. From the Pharaoh's home to the
bonded labour in Egypt. Everyone lost someone in their
home. The power of the blood, the
power of the sprinkled blood. By faith, Moses kept the
Passover. Today we are no different.
We can sometimes read these things as these incredible
stories which maybe give us goosebumps and we think, well,
that was them. But I want to encourage you
something about something. Today we know the power of the
blood. We know that it speaks.
We know that it opened the way. We know that it washes our sins
clean. But if we don't appropriate that
power in our lives, we're going to live powerless, empty lives.
We're going to live lives that are defeated by sin again and
again, even though the battle was already won.
Today we have that blood of Jesus in us, but it requires for
us to appropriate it. When you look at the the
sacrificial system, the priests had to dip their hands in the
blood. They had to actually touch it.
When they when they cut the throat of the animal, when it
bled out, they would collect the the blood in a vessel.
And I'm sure there was a whole lot of blood on their hands.
Ignore the pun, there was a lot of blood on their hands.
And then when Moses and the priests had to dedicate the
Tabernacle, they had to dip their hands in and they had to
sprinkle it. They had to sprinkle it.
He had to apply it on the left lobe of Aaron and his sons and
on different places to sanctify them, to mark them as being set
apart. What am I trying to say?
They had to get their hands messy with the blood.
There was no, you couldn't be, you know, all being germophobic
at that point, because when the blood flowed, you had to
actually be there to touch it, to apply it when Moses and the
Jews at that time had to apply it on the doorpost.
You think that was a a clean job?
No, it was a messy job. They probably got the animal's
blood on their clothes, on the floor.
And you know, when they were sprinkling it, some of it must
have dripped on them. Appropriation is everything.
The blood of Jesus was shed for us.
Yes, it flowed from that. His body slowed down, I'm sure,
But you and I need to take the effort to appropriate it and
make it ours. Today I want to ask you, have
you ever tried this? Have you tried to appropriate
the blood of Jesus on your life? Have you appropriated it over
your children's lives? Have you appropriated it over
your home, over your office, over the things that you love
and own? What do I mean by that?
So this past few weeks we have
moved from, you know, all of us use ACS at home in Chennai
because it's really hot and I have a problem wherein when it's
cold, I when you know, I need a comforter.
When it's warm also I need a comforter because I can't bear
the cold of the AC. And so this past week we have a
comforter which we use, but it only works for geshom.
For me, it's way too cold even with the comforter.
So through the week from Sunday evening, I was trying out
different bed sheets over the comforter just for my side, you
know, to keep me a little extra warm because I wasn't sleeping
well at all. I kept waking up because of the
cold switching off the AC, switching it back on.
It was exhausting. Finally, on Wednesday night, I
just, I tried a new blanket. So this was, you know, a little
heavier and it just rested on the comforter, didn't move off
in the night. And on Wednesday night I had the
best sleep ever because the the comforter stayed, the blanket on
top of it stayed. I was at the right optimal
temperature and I could sleep well.
I didn't have to wake up. I didn't have to switch off the
AC, none of that. And when I woke up in the
morning, I was thinking about, you know, how I had to
experiment so much with these different coverings till I
settled on this one blanket that worked.
And I felt like God was reminding me that that's what
the blood of Jesus is. It's a covering.
And too many of us have been trying different coverings on
our life. We make sure we have the best
insurance, home insurance, health insurance, dental
insurance. Some of us are so concerned
about the right networks because if this business fails, that
opportunity may come in. Too many of us are trusting in
friendships and thinking that they will be our covering.
Some of us love our marriages so much that we think our spouses
are covering. For those of you who are older,
you're so worried about your retirement, you think your
children are going to be the covering.
Rightly so. But God is coming to this place
of asking us. My blood is your covering today.
If I stand before my Heavenly Father and I can speak to him
boldly, I can speak to him As a friend.
I can speak to him and tell him my heart's desires, I can weep
before him. It is because I am covered by
the blood of the lamb. He sees me as redeemed.
He sees me as ransomed. He sees me as pure.
I'm covered. You are covered.
What? I'll fitting cover.
Have you been using? The problem is the covers that
we use. Like I mentioned, it could be
people, it could be situations, it could be our jobs.
There's so many things that we tend to use as coverings to
protect ourselves, to make sure that you know, all our ducks are
in a row. The problem with that is they
will not bring lasting peace. The evidence of the covering and
its legitimacy in your life is the peace that it will bring.
When you appropriate the blood of Jesus as you're covering,
when you believe and say, Lord, I claim the blood of Jesus over
myself, I believe that I'm healed.
When you claim it over a child who's who's out of control and
say I plead the blood of Jesus on this child, I know that your
blood has already washed him clean.
He's OK. He's going to be fine.
When we believe that the blood of Jesus washed this person or
this situation, when we pleaded over our lives, it changes
everything. It changes how we look at our
current situation. And the important thing is that
when we begin to appropriate the blood of Jesus into our lives,
we see three things happen. And that's what I want to leave
with you. The first thing is you have
peace with God. Romans chapter 5 verses 9 to 10.
Now that we are set right with God by means of the sacrificial
death, the consummate blood sacrifice, there is no longer a
question of being at odds with God in any way.
If when we were at our worst, we were put on friendly terms with
God by the sacrificial death of his Son.
But now that we are at our best, just think of how our lives will
expand and deepen by means of his resurrection life.
Isn't that amazing? When we were at our worst, we
were put on friendly terms with God by the sacrificial death of
his Son. The blood of Jesus got you
peace. Maybe you're someone who's
saying I don't understand God's ways.
He feels unkind. He feels mean.
He took away my job. He allowed my marriage to
crumble. A child that was wayward left.
How is he still good? I can't be at peace with this
God. I can't pray to him.
I don't know what the outcomes are going to look like.
It looks all over the place. It feels too unpredictable.
I want you to remember that when you appropriate the blood into
your life, you come into this place of, I should say, just
this casual relaxation when it comes into being in the hands of
God. You realize that God.
Yes, I'm having these health issues, but you've got it.
Your blood has washed me clean. Bio stripes.
I am healed. I'll be OK.
The blood unites us with God. It makes peace with him so that
I begin to view his ways through the lens of his beautiful
character, Not through my expectations, because my
expectations are so warped. But I begin to look at him and
say, Lord, I know that you have a plan.
Even in this, even in this huge set back.
I know you have a plan, and the blood of Jesus does this.
When you appropriate and say, Lord, I apply your blood upon
this particular situation which is disturbed, disturbing me so
much, he'll begin to give you fresh perspective where you will
start to accept his sovereignty in your life.
That's the beautiful thing. The blood of Jesus enables you
to accept that he is God. He can do as He pleases, but he
will do good. He will turn anything around for
good, for his glory. The second thing is when we
appropriate the blood of Jesus, we have peace with ourselves.
Isaiah chapter 53, verses two to six.
It says the servant grew up before God.
A scrawny seedling, a scrubby plant in a parched field.
There was nothing attractive about him, nothing to cause us
to take a second look. He was looked down on and passed
over a man who suffered, who knew pain first hand.
One look at him and people turned away.
We looked down on him, thought he was scum, but the fact is it
was our pains. He carried our disfigurements,
all the things wrong with us. We thought he brought it on
himself that God was punishing him for his own failures, but it
was our sins that did that to him that ripped and tore and
crushed him our sins. He took the punishment and that
made us whole. Through his bruises we get
healed. We are all like sheep who
wandered off and gotten lost. We've all done our own thing,
gone our own way, and God has piled all our sins, everything
we have done wrong on him, on him by it says he took the
punishment and that made us whole spirit, soul and body.
So often the reason we feel out of control all over the place is
because they're not In Sync. We feel discordant because
stuff's going on inside, but we're speaking something
different. We're acting in a different way,
but God is saying that because of the blood that was spilt on
your behalf, that blood doesn't just physically heal you, it
heals you spiritually. It heals your emotions.
It heals every part of your life so that at the end of your life
you are completely whole. When you're presented to God
himself, isn't that amazing? So your dislocated parts of your
life, your wounded, broken pieces, will come together when
the blood of Jesus washes over you.
I love the description for Shalom that Eugene Peterson
gives. He says it's a vibrating
wholeness that resonates throughout your being.
It's that abundance that Jesus talked about in John 1010.
I have come that you may have. Life in abundance is basically
peace that holds all the bits together.
Isn't that amazing? And so that's what happens.
When we appropriate the blood of Jesus on ourselves, we have
peace with ourselves. When we appropriated the blood
of Jesus on ourselves, we have peace with God and we finally
have peace with one another. One Corinthians, chapter 10,
verses 16 to 17, it says, is the cup of blessing which we bless
at the Lord's Supper not a sharing in the blood of Christ?
Indeed it is. Is the bread which we break, not
a sharing in the body of Christ. Indeed it is.
Since there is one bread, we believers, who are many, are
united into one body. For we all partake of the one
bread which represents the body of Christ.
That is what we do at communion. When we actually partake of the
Lord's table, we are actually uniting ourselves with others
whom the blood connected us with.
Today, the body of Christ is our greatest gift.
I love that when we go to another country, we go to
another city. The minute you see a fellow
follower of Jesus, you know the connection which comes as so
uncanny. We may look different, we may
have different languages, we may be part of different
denominations. But the fact that we love Jesus
unites us so fast. It's important that we apply the
blood of Jesus over our relationships because then we
truly experience peace. Will there be discord?
Will there be issues? Yes.
But the blood of Jesus brings peace.
The blood of Jesus unites US against all odds, however
different we are. No matter what our upbringings,
no matter what our socio economic status looks like, the
blood of Jesus brings us together.
Even as I close, I want to just ask you this.
Do you know Jesus for yourself? We often take it for granted
that as you're listening in that you know the Lord personally.
But if you don't know Jesus, I would encourage you to make a
decision today. It's a very simple thing, like I
began. John introduced John the
Baptist, introduced Jesus, his cousin, saying, look, the Lamb
of God that takes away the sins of the world.
You and I primarily have to admit that we are sinners in
need of a saviour. And if you are someone who's
saying I need Jesus, I I've heard of him, He seems nice, but
I feel so sinful on my own. I don't think I can save myself.
I need Jesus. Can I lead you into a very
simple prayer? It's a prayer where we just say,
Lord, I'm a Sinner. I need you.
I believe that you sent your son.
I believe that he died for me. I believe that he rose again.
And I believe that he's going to walk with me into eternity, that
I'm going to have a life full of purpose.
That's all it takes. It's that simple a prayer.
And the beautiful thing is that as soon as you pray that prayer,
you first of all become part of the body of Christ of which he's
the head. But more importantly, your sins
are immediately washed. You have access to the Holy of
Holies, the presence of God himself.
And not just that, it doesn't end with that.
You now have access to the new life, a life that is filled,
where you have power to overcome the things that you were a slave
to before. So, as I pray, would you repeat
the simple prayer after me? This is for those who don't know
Jesus. Heavenly Father, I admit that
I'm a Sinner. I admit that I cannot save
myself. I need a Saviour.
I invite Jesus, the Son of God into my life.
I believe that he came to earth, died for me, rose again, and is
now alive in heaven. I believe that he now lives in
me and will be with me as I navigate life here on earth.
I love you. Heavenly Father, thank you for
choosing me and setting me apart to know you in Jesus name.
Amen. Amen.
Welcome to the family of God. You belong to Jesus now.
You're one of his. You're a child of God.
You have incredible things lying ahead of you.
So I just want to congratulate you as you've started this
incredible journey. The blood of Jesus has washed
you. It has set you apart.
If you have never appropriated the blood of Jesus into your
life, if you feel I have used every other covering known to
man, you know, much like Adam and Eve, when they sinned, they
took fig leaves and tried to cover themselves.
But God knew that was such an insufficient thing because the
minute you plucked a leaf off its stalk and put it on you, it
would wither. It's not a permanent covering.
The blood of Jesus is a permanent covering.
It covers you so that when you stand before the throne, you are
counted as righteous. It covers you.
It cleanses you. It wipes away everything.
It speaks God's love over you. It speaks his mercy and
forgiveness over you. And so I want to ask that if you
have never appropriated this love, you've never claimed it
over your life. You've never pleaded it over
your life. Today I want to lead you in that
prayer, believing that as you do so, you're going to have peace
with God. Maybe you've been wrestling with
God. Maybe you've been saying God.
I don't want certain things that you are promising because it
feels like it comes with strings attached.
I don't know your heart, God. Maybe you've been struggling
with yourself, with ailment after ailment, set back, after
set back, Emotional, physical, financial, any area, he says.
I want to bring peace within yourself.
Maybe you've been struggling relationally in your family with
your friends. Plead the blood of Jesus over
those relationships. Can we do that together?
Father in heaven, we just thank you because you are here.
We thank you for the great gift of your Son, Jesus, how much it
must have pained you to watch your son go through that
suffering at the hands of other image bearers.
Thank you, Father, for that plan of redemption.
Thank you for the perfect sacrifice that Jesus was.
And even now, Lord, we just plead the blood of Jesus upon
ourselves, upon our families, upon our circumstances, upon our
homes of Father, that you would fill every place with your
fullness, that you would bring peace like never before.
I pray your Father, that you will wash away everything that
is not of you, that God you will open up, Lord, areas that have
been so dark and dank to the brilliance of your light and
presence. Father, I pray where negativity
has spoken into our lives that Lord the blood of Jesus would
speak life and truth and hope Once we pray in the name of
Jesus and believe that we are covered by the blood of the
Lamb. We thank you that your blood
flows through our veins today. We thank you that you are
healing us from deep within at the DNA level.
You're bringing healing, Lord of the emotional level, you're
bringing healing. Father, thank you that our
spirits, which have been dead for very long, are being revived
by the blood of Jesus. We thank you, Lord, that by your
stripes we are healed. We thank you that the
chastisement that I should have been on us was on you.
And because of that, Lord, today we are set free.
We thank you, We love you, We glorify you.
We pray that Lord our lives would scream and shout of Your
grace, your mercy and your forgiveness.
We submit ourselves to you, cover us with your precious
blood. In Jesus name I pray.
Amen. Amen.
God bless you, even as you get into this last two days of the
Lent season. Can I just ask that you would
take some time on this weekend to just spend some time with the
Lord? Ask him to show you things that
maybe you missed in the past 40 days.
Ask him to reveal himself clearer than before, and maybe
you haven't had the time to pray or intercede for someone.
But if you could spend some time this weekend just pleading the
blood of Jesus on yourself and asking God to move in a powerful
way, can you do that? I hope you can.
God bless you. God bless you.
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