Crossed-Up: Sacrifice Mark 15:25 39
How many of you remember
the 1984 commercial with “Fred the Baker” as he got up day after day after day
to make the donuts? You would watch him
get up, barely awake, and drag himself out the door on the way to make the
donuts, then return home from making the donuts…over and over again until he
finally meets himself, saying, “It’s time to make the donuts,” and responding
to himself, “I made the donuts.” While
we all laughed, you could see the weariness on his face as he got up to repeat
the same task he has done the previous day.
Despite the
humor intended, many of us could sympathize with Fred. Most of us can think of times in our lives
where we found ourselves having to repeat the same task or the same job or make
the same efforts over and over again. We
may not have had to rise before dawn, but the weariness of repetition would set
in, especially if the actions we were repeated were because the results of what
we had done the first time were only temporary and would not hold. I’ve kind of felt that way with my Toyota
lately, taking it to get it worked on because the check engine light was on and
it wasn’t running well and I was weeks away from it needing to be
inspected. Having the first problem
fixed, driving it again only to have the check engine light come immediately
back on and having to have it fixed again.
Driving it a few days and taking it to be inspected only to be told I
needed to drive it some more, and doing so having the light come on again. It began to feel like an endless cycle of a
problem occurring, fixing it, only to have a new problem appear. Even now it sits at one of our local repair
shops as they try to sort out what exactly we need to do. The weariness has begun to set in—to the
point of trying to figure out the equivalent of taking it out behind a barn and
borrowing a shotgun.
The author of
Hebrews almost offers us a similar picture of the work of the Jewish priests
who every year on the Day of Atonement, “And the priest stands day after day at
his service, offering again and again the same sacrifices that can never take
away sins.”[i] We get this image of the work of the priests
almost being futile as they would offer sacrifice for the cleansing of God’s
people. He would have to do it over and
over again, because the work he did one year did nothing for the sins that the
people would continue to commit, for they had not been freed from sin, and were
still bound to it.
We find
ourselves in the midst of our “Crossed-up” series, reflecting on what Mark
Driscol calls a “multi-faceted jewel”[ii]
and Adam Hamilton suggests is a “masterpiece of art”[iii],
a deeper understanding of what Jesus accomplishes on the cross. This is usually referred to as “Atonement” --
the means at which the work of Christ makes us “at-one” with God, freeing us
from our sin. Two weeks ago, we
considered that what Jesus does on the cross is not something to change God,
but rather to confront us with the ugliness of our sin and set before us an
example of living out faithfulness to God—calling for a change in us—that was
the Subjective or Moral Influence Theory of Atonement. The first week of our series, we recognized
that death is the true penalty for sin and that because of our sin, we all
deserve death. However, Christ
voluntarily went to the cross, taking our punishment upon Himself, and died our
death, that we might live. This is the
Substitutionary Theory of Atonement—in which Christ takes our place and on the
cross, God looks upon Jesus and sees our sin, and looking at us, God sees
righteousness, not our own, but the righteousness of Christ.
Today we come
to, like the Substitutionary Theory, one of the most widely understood views of
the cross, and that is an understanding of the crucifixion, not necessarily as
Jesus being a substitute for us (while all the theories of the atonement
compliment and are part of one another), but of Jesus being the ultimate and
perfect sacrifice for sin—the Sacrificial Theory of Atonement.
Since the Fall
of humanity in the Garden, animals have been sacrificed as a means of covering
sin—just as God slew the creatures whose hides would clothe Adam and Eve. As time moved on and God’s community was
established, the sacrifice of sheep, bulls, and goats became a sign by which
the community would express their remorse and repentance and seek God’s
forgiveness. While sin and guilt
sacrifices were brought regularly to the priests, once a year, as we mentioned
when we talked about the Substitutionary theory, God’s people would celebrate
the Day of Atonement. We briefly
mentioned the two goats, focusing on the “scapegoat,” the goat which the priest
would lay his hands on, symbolically transferring the sins of the people onto
that goat, and then the goat was driving from the community, symbolically
taking on the sins of the people and removing them. However, before the “scapegoat” was driven
from the community, there was the matter of the first goat…the first goat, as a
means of expressing the remorse of the people over their sin, and seeking God’s
forgiveness, would be sacrificed, and its blood sprinkled upon the altar.
Day after day
with regular animal sacrifices as guilt and sin offerings and year after year
with the Day of Atonement goat sacrifices, these priests would preside, first
in the Tabernacle, and later in the Temple, in a repetitive ritual of sacrifice
for sin. The animal being sacrificed was
to be without blemish, symbolizing its innocence and perfection, however it was
still an animal and not human…it could not truly be a perfect sacrifice to
remove the sins of fallen humanity. Only
a perfect human could be the ultimate and perfect sacrifice, and since all of
humanity was fallen, there was no sacrifice that could truly cover our sin…that
is until Christ, who being both fully human and fully divine offered His own
life as the perfect sacrifice for our sins.
Christ, the perfect Lamb of God, sacrificed himself that we might be
clothed not in animal skins that temporarily cover our sin, but clothed in His
righteousness, His blood offered on the cross completely washes away our sin,
so that God sees the loving Sacrifice of His Son rather than our sin-filled
lives. Just as in the Substitutionary
theory of the atonement, once again we see that Christ has done for us what we
could not do for ourselves, voluntarily laying down His life for our
forgiveness.
And with the
sacrifice of Christ, the sacrificial system for sins, was complete. As the author of Hebrews tells us “But when
Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, ‘he sat down at
the right hand of God’…For by a single offering he has perfected for all time
those who are sanctified. And as the
Holy Spirit also testifies to us, for after saying, ‘This is the covenant that
I will make with them after those days, says the Lord: I will put my laws in
their hearts and I will write them on their minds,’ he also adds, ‘I will
remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.’ Where there is forgiveness of these, there is
no longer any offering for sin.”[iv] It is over, it is done, it is finished!
If, in Christ,
the final and ultimate sacrifice has been made, and in that sacrifice, our sin
has been completely removed, does that mean that we can no longer sin? NO!
With our free will, there is constantly the temptation to turn from God,
and place ourselves back in the center of the universe thinking everything
revolves around us and our desires, and in doing so, we sin again.
However,
consider the effects of a sacrifice?
If we were to
find out that our parents gave up security in retirement, or even more gave up
rest or even meals, that they might be able to send us to college, how would we
view our classes and grades? We might
not ever miss a class again and strive to find ourselves on the President’s
list every semester, that we might honor their sacrifice.
If we watched
our spouse give up her career that we might pursue ours, how might we treat our
career? We might strive to achieve all
that we can so that we can honor her sacrifice?
If we were on
our deathbed, needing a kidney transplant in order to live, how might we treat
and care for our bodies when our family member, friend, or even a stranger,
puts their life on hold and at risk, because they are the only match, and
sacrifices one of their kidneys for us?
We might make sure that we never do anything that would risk damaging
that kidneys, and might be driven to adopt a healthier lifestyle than we had
been living.
Their sacrifices
don’t force us to work better in school or harder at our careers or take better
care of our lives, but to honor what their sacrifices enabled us to do, we can
choose to do so.
How much more,
then, should we consider the sacrifice of Christ when considering our sin? Should we go on sinning (as Paul was asked)
knowing that death of Christ has covered that sin? Should we insult the sacrifice of Christ by
saying, “I know that gossip is wrong, I know that stealing is wrong, I know
that gambling is wrong, I know that I shouldn’t tell this joke, I know I
shouldn’t skip church, I know I shouldn’t, I know I shouldn’t, but I’m going to
go ahead and do it. I’ll ask God to
forgive me later, and He will?
Or should we
fall on our knees in remorse, humbly thanking God for the forgiveness that He
has offered, and strive toward Christlike perfection in our own lives—maybe
never achieving it—but never intentionally mocking the sacrifice of Christ by
desiring to sin again.
In the Name of
the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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