“…the truth which abides in us and will be with us forever” (2 John 2). When the truth enters into our memory and becomes our constitution, it remains in our being as source of long-term nourishment, supplying our own being and enabling us to render timely help to others.
Continuing our fellowship on some basic topics with which we need to be fully equipped, we come to the precious blood of Christ, an essential element for our continual spiritual life. Just as we need certain basic items to sustain our physical life, we need some essential elements for our spiritual life. The blood of Christ is such an essential item.
Firstly, the blood of Christ solves the problem of our separation from God. After man sinned, God was more concerned with the separation between Him and man than with what man had done (Gen. 3:9). Isaiah 59:1-2: “No, Jehovah’s hand is not so short that it cannot save; nor is His ear so heavy that it cannot hear. But your iniquities have become a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you so that He does not hear.” These verses show us the problem of separation from God caused by our sins. The blood is mainly to satisfy God, not us, and after we confess our sins we should not worry about any feeling or lack of feeling. We can believe in God’s word that the problem of separation from God has been fully taken care of!
Exodus 12:13: “…when I see the blood, I will pass over you”
John 1:29: “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.”
Secondly, this precious blood solves the problem of guilt in our conscience. Hebrews 9:14 clearly shows us the application of the blood to our conscience: “How much more will the blood of Christ…purify our conscience from dead works.” We can be assured that the guilt-stain of sin is purged from the record by 1 John 1:9, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” In Psalm 103:12, the psalmist says, “As far as the east is from the west,/ So far has He removed our transgressions from us.” We must let these words penetrate our being again and again, and lead others to appreciate them as well. God has no memory, no record, of the sins that we have confessed (Jeremiah 31:34). We can help the new believers know how to pray to confess their sins when their conscience is guilty, “O God, I admit I have done this, I was wrong. I receive the cleansing of the blood of Jesus your Son. Thank you for your righteous forgiveness”.
Lastly, we must see that the blood works to speak against the enemy Satan, who is “the accuser of the brothers”. Once we confess our sins, God is satisfied. But Satan is never satisfied, and he would continue to bother us and try to wear us out. God’s shining is supplying and specific, while Satan’s accusation is draining and general, leaving us feeling uneasy. We can see from Revelation 12:10-11 that we can overcome this accuser by speaking directly to him–the word of our testimony–that we overcome him by the precious blood of the Lamb: “…for the accuser of our brothers has been cast down, who accuses them before our God day and night. And they overcame him because of the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of their testimony.” We can speak to the devil, telling him to see the blood of Jesus, and that based on this blood and its efficacy he has no ground to accuse us!
Though many of these verses and points may be familiar we need to have them to the point of 2 John 2, having the truth abiding in us and with us forever. May the Lord give us grace to gain a solid constitution with the truth from His word.
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