Lenten Devotion – Jesus our Sacrifice
Day 39, 29 March 2024 (Good Friday)
“Then he said, “Here I am, I have come to do your will.” He sets aside the first to establish the second. And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” Hebrews 10:9-10
Dealing with the problem of sin and guilt is one of the most vexing conundrum of human existence. Do ten good deeds cancel out the bad deed you had committed? And why ten only? How about a hundred good deeds to show our sincere sorrow of our sins?
So the problem of sin and guilt ultimately has to do with forgiveness. Can God forgive us of our sins? What do we have to do to earn the forgiveness of God?
I have spoken with many non-Christians and deep down, they are simply searching for forgiveness. We all know that we have let others down, ourselves down and God down in some ways. Many practices in other religions try to deal with this issue by prescribing acts of penitence.
The Jews in the Old Testament too had to offer annual sacrifices of animals for the cleansing of their sins. Even though this requirement was exacting, it was still not effective. The author of Hebrews tells us that “it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins” (Hebrews 10:4)
Knowing this, God in his great mercy did for us what we could never achieve for ourselves. It was the will of the Father to send Jesus to be the true sacrifice for our sins. And Jesus had to be fully human – that is, to have a human body – to be an effective sacrifice for us.
St Gregory of Nazianzus, a church father of the fourth century, explained the need for Jesus to die in a human body: “That which is not assumed is not healed.”
At this Good Friday, let us be fully thankful for the effectiveness of Christ’s sacrifice to take our sins and make us holy in God’s sight. What had been impossible throughout the ages have been granted graciously to us by Jesus Christ our Saviour and Lord!
Revd Ian🙏