Tim Maas Retired Quality Assurance Specialist with the U.S. Army

God is holy -- that is, utterly without sin. Under the Old Testament Law that was given by God to Israel through Moses, human sin (that is, disobedience to the Law) was regarded so seriously by God that its consequences were both temporal and eternal death -- temporal death through the eventual ending of earthly life (expressed by the Bible as the shedding of each person's blood, since the life of each human was regarded as being in his or her blood), and eternal death through separation from God forever. Since all humans were sinners, this would have been their universal fate.

However, God, in mercy and grace, instituted a substitutionary program of the shedding of the blood of sacrificial animals (Leviticus 17:11) as a means by which the sins of humans could be forgiven, looking forward to the time when God Himself would become human in the person of Jesus Christ. He lived the sinless life of which no other human could ever be capable, and then, through the voluntary shedding of His own innocent blood, made a full and final blood sacrifice for the sins of all humanity that was acceptable in God's eyes (as validated by Christ's subsequent resurrection from the dead).

This made it possible for humans to place their faith and hope for eternal life in the salvation gained by Christ (rather than depending on their own imperfect, sinful efforts) for being able to live forever in God's presence.

They were therefore "set free" by their faith from the prior system of works-based salvation that could only result in their eternal condemnation by God, as well as in eternal separation from Him, and could thus live eternally in God's presence as a result of their faith in Christ.

July 05 2021 • 1 response • Vote Up • Share • Report