Why the Blood? The Bible's Answer to Forgiveness & Faith

Hello, and welcome to Through the Bible with Les Feldick. An Oklahoma rancher and farmer, Les Feldick has been teaching homestyle Bible classes for 20 years in Iowa, Oklahoma, and Texas. Les Feldick's unique style of Bible teaching has made the books of the Bible come to life. When Les is teaching, it's so interesting that people say time just seems to fly by. And now, here is Les Feldick. Okay, good to have everybody back again. We're going to take another look at all the ramifications of the crucifixion and all that it pertains to us, even though it is now almost 2,000 years after. And I'm going to have you turn with me to 1 Corinthians chapter 5. And while you're doing that, again, we like to always welcome our television audience and let you know, for those of you just tuning in, that we're just an informal Bible class. We're not affiliated with any one group. We've got several different denominations here in the studio, and I think one night Monty, didn't you count ten? I think one night Monty, after the class was over, said, You know how many different denominations we had here tonight? And I said, No, I don't know where the people go, or anything like that. And he said, Well we had ten that I could pick out. So we just like to reach people across the whole spectrum, and as I've said on the program before and I'll say it again, we don't try to twist arms and get you out of one group into another. We just want you to get into the Book, and learn to study it on your own. Not just read it, but to study it. And as you study, the Holy Spirit will just give you wisdom and knowledge. On the board of course are the cities where we have our weekly classes, and I think Helen also put a contact number. So if you're in any of these areas, and you're interested in coming to a class, just call the number opposite the town, and they'll tell you where we are, and all the details. Now let's turn to I Corinthians chapter 5, verse 7. Of course Paul, the apostle of the Gentiles, writing to a Gentile church there at Corinth, and he says, "...Purge out therefore the old leaven," now leaven always spoke of what? Sin, evil. "...Purge it out, that you may be a new lump, as you are unleavened," in other words, salvation takes away the stigma of sin, "...for even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us." You see the language? Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us. Now of course John, when he saw Jesus coming, called it the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. But the Passover Lamb, let's go all the way back to Exodus, if you will, chapter 12, because as Paul says in Romans 15, I think it's verse 4, that all these things written before time, that is the Old Testament, are written for our learning, not for our doctrine necessarily, but for our learning. Now there's a big difference. As we learn all the pictures of the types and everything that took place back in the Old Testament, it enhances what we have to understand, of course, in the New. Now in Exodus chapter 12, the nation of Israel of course has been there in bondage, in slavery, under the heavy hand of the Egyptians. God has been pouring out the plagues upon the Egyptians, the first few of course Israel experienced as well, and then God put a division where the Jews no longer experienced the plagues that fell on Egypt. The final one of course is going to be the worst one of all, and the one that really struck home to families and parents, was the death of the firstborn. You all know the background to that. The angel would fly over, and every house in Egypt would lose the firstborn. Everything firstborn, even the livestock, would die. But Israel had an out, but it depended on their faith, and that was that if they would put the blood of the Passover lamb on the doorposts, and then stay within the safety of their home, the death angel would pass over. And so this is the beginning then of what the Jews still celebrate today in the Spring of the Year, Passover. Now I always like to make the point that Passover and Atonement are two totally different Feast Days. Passover was in the Spring, associated of course with the Spring Equinox, and Atonement or Yom Kippur, as they call it today, is in the Fall of the Year. Now Christ of course is our Passover, but we�re also going to see in another program, and that�s when I�m going to cover that period of time I mentioned in the last program from 12 noon till 3 in the afternoon, I�m going to draw that out in the analogy of His work of Atonement. But for now we�re going to look at the Passover aspect, and that is the protection that was given by the blood of the Lamb. Exodus 12, verse 12, where God now is instructing Moses and Aaron, and He says, Exodus 12, verse 12, �For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, man and beast, and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment. I am the LORD.� Now verse 13, �And the blood, that is of the Passover Lamb, the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where you are, and when I see the blood I will pass over you. And the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I smite the land of Egypt.� Now when we were way back in Exodus a couple of years ago, and we were studying it verse by verse, I made it a point to ask, especially for those of you in the studio, that you now these Israelites who had placed the blood on the door, they are now in their little cabins and their little houses, whatever they were abiding in, standing around that table ready to eat the Passover Lamb. Were they standing there in fear and trepidation, or did they have that calm feeling of security? What do you think? Calm and secure. Because you see, by faith they had done what God had said to do, and that was apply the blood on the door posts. Now their faith of course is what gave them their security, but God not only looked at their faith, He also looked at the door posts, didn�t He? And it was when He saw the blood, that He saw their faith, and that He gave them their safety. Now lock that in, that it was never without blood. In other words, there may have been a possibility of a Jew, I don�t think it happened, but a possibility of a Jew who said, �Well I don�t see any need for putting blood on the door, but knowing what�s going on out there, I�m going to stay inside tonight.� Would he have been safe? No, because it was the blood applied that gave them their security and their safety. And they could stand at that table eating that Passover Lamb in complete calmness, in complete safety, knowing that the God who had said it, would keep it. My, what I�ve tried to convince people that it�s the grace of God that saves us, absolutely. Nobody has any trouble with that. I didn�t deserve salvation, you didn�t deserve salvation, that was God�s grace. But so many people can�t comprehend that that same grace is what keeps us. I don�t deserve to be saved six hours of the day. None of us do, because we just can�t live that perfectly. Oh we�d like to, but we don�t. We can�t, we�re human. And so why does God continue to keep us? His grace, His grace, His grace, and I can�t emphasize that enough. Now there were a lot of these Jews who were under the safety of the blood. Did they deserve to be? No, but they were there, and the blood guaranteed their safety. And this is what we have to understand. That it was through their exercise of faith, but it was the blood applied to the door that guaranteed the angel would pass over. The blood. Now we were mentioning in one of our classes the other night, there are a lot of people in our present time who don�t want to hear anything about the blood. It has almost become taboo to talk about the blood. But listen, you can�t escape it in Scripture. You can�t go around it. You can�t go over it. You can�t go under it. You have to face it head on, that from the very onset of the human experience, God has demanded a blood sacrifice before there can be a remission of sin. Now again it goes back to His sovereign mind in creation. Where did God put the life of living things? In the blood. Now science didn�t even catch on to that until about World War II, that life is in the blood. And it�s His prescription, not anyone else�s, that without the shedding of blood there can be no forgiveness, and we can�t bypass it. Now let�s go back then, all the way to the New Testament again. I�m going to take you all the way into Romans, because after all as I�ve stressed so often on this program and in my classes, it�s the Apostle Paul now that has the revelations that pertain to us. Not that we exclusively read Paul, not at all. But it�s in Paul that so many of the things that were never covered in previous Scriptures, now come out in full flower. Romans chapter 3. Oh let�s drop down to verse 23. The verse that I always maintain is the first step for salvation. We have to recognize our need. We have to see ourselves as God sees us. Romans 3 verse 23, Romans 3. Romans 3. For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God. Everyone, no one has ever been anything but. Now verse 24. Romans 3. For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God. Everyone, no one has ever been anything but. Romans 3. For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God. Everyone, no one has ever been anything but. Now that�s what redemption is. It�s losing control of a piece of property, and then the only way you can regain that control is to buy it back. That�s redemption. God lost the human race when Adam fell, and immediately He had to put in motion the whole process of redemption. Buying us back with a price, and of course the price was His own blood. Now verse 25. Romans 3. For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God. Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His, what? Blood. Now you can�t avoid that. It�s through faith in His blood, His shed blood, because there was power in that divine blood. Oh, now that brings up another subject. Oh, I wish I had more time. You know, here�s where I like my two hour classes. You know, about that time somebody will ask a question, and we can just chase rabbits and cover them. But you see, why was His blood divine even though He was born of a human mother? Well, like we like to point out, you see, since God was the Father, and the blood system of a fetus does not come from the mother, it comes from the Father. So even though Jesus was born of a human mother, He had no human blood. It was divine, and it had all the power of the Eternal Godhead in it. So here we come now, that we have to place our faith in His blood. Now just as sure as there�s resurrection power to be dealt with, so also as the hymn writer has put it, there is power in the blood. Don�t you love that old song? Boy, you know I still say they can�t write the songs like they used to. I�m still an adherent of the old hymns. There�s power in the blood. Absolutely there�s power in that blood. It�s divine. It was originated in God, and as we will see in a later lesson, it�s that blood that was presented in the very throne room of Heaven. Now reading on. Ephesians 2, verse 25, "...through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are passed through the forbearance, or the mercy and the grace of God. To declare, I say at this time, His righteousness, none of ours, that He, God, might be just, absolutely fair in doing what? Justifying us who believe." See that? Justifying and it�s all based again upon His finished work. All right, let�s turn over to Ephesians. Ephesians chapter 1, because the Scripture makes such a point of it that we dare not ignore it. Ephesians chapter 1, and just for sake of time, let�s drop right down to verse 7. Ordinarily I don�t like to take just one verse, but this one is all right in this instance. Ephesians 1, verse 7, "...in whom," that is in Christ up there in verse 5, "...in whom we have redemption," in other words we�ve experienced that being bought back, "...through His blood." Do you see that? "...in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace." Grace cancels out anything that we can do to merit. Grace says, I�m doing it only because I love you, not because you deserve it. All right, let�s go to another one. Colossians, just keep going to the right. Colossians chapter 1. I always have to start at verse 12 in this particular portion. Colossians chapter 1, verse 12, where Paul writes again to a Gentile congregation, giving thanks unto the Father who hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light, who, speaking of the Father, hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son, in whom," that is in the Son, "...in whom we have redemption, how? Through His," what? "...blood, even the forgiveness of sins." Now then he continues on in verse 15 to show whose blood this really is. The Christ who is the image, or the visible appearance of the invisible God. You see, "...the firstborn of every creature, for by Him were all things created that are in heaven, in the earth, visible, invisible," and so on and so forth. All right, let�s go look at another one, a little more to the right, go all the way back to Peter�s little epistle. First Peter chapter 1, drop down to verse 18 and 19. First Peter chapter 1, verses 18 and 19. Verse 18, forasmuch Peter writes, now remember Peter writes this just shortly before he�s martyred. This is a long time after he first preached back there in the early Acts. So he says, "...forasmuch as you know that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers, but," here�s how we�re redeemed, "...with the precious blood of Christ," that�s the only thing that can pay our sin debt, "...but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot." Now that has to take us all the way back to Exodus. I wasn�t planning to do this, but come on, all the way back to Exodus chapter 12. Exodus chapter 12, there�s a lot of this whole concept of the Passover lamb, and how Christ fulfilled it, and how He has indeed shed His blood to purchase our redemption. Well, this all began in type, or in picture, back here with the nation of Israel. Exodus chapter 12, we�ll might as well start verse 1. Exodus 12, verse 1, "...the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying, This month shall be unto you the beginning of months, and it shall be the first month of the year to you." What month was it? Our April, that�s the first month in the Jewish calendar, at least back here. Exodus 12, verse 3, "...speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying, In the tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb for a house, or a family. If the household be too little for the lamb, let him and his neighbor next to his house take it, according to the number of souls, every man according to his eating shall make your count for the lamb." Now verse 5, "...your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year, and you shall take it out from the sheep, or from the goats." And then verse 6, what were they to do with it? They were to bring it up, pin it up I guess we�d say in our vernacular, until the 14th. Now that of course would be three full days wouldn�t it? Now why were they to look at that lamb for those three full days? To make sure there was no blemish. And they would examine that lamb every day, and if there was the slightest thing wrong with it, they�d have to reject it for being their Passover lamb. But if after that three days of scrutiny they were satisfied it was perfect, it was without blemish, then they could offer it as their Passover lamb. Now what was the picture? The three days were comparable to his three years of earthly ministry, where also he proved himself without blemish. As Paul says, He who knew no sin, he never sinned. His three years was impeccable, and he proved himself worthy to be the Passover lamb. A lamb without blemish, and without spot. Well now if you�ll come back to the New Testament once again, now I�d like to have you look at Hebrews if you will. Hebrews chapter 9, verse 22. Because I want you and our television audience to understand, regardless of what the liberals may say, and I don�t care if they take all the songs with reference to the blood out of your hymn book, don�t let that fool you, don�t let that throw a curve at you. The Bible is still the Bible, it�s still the Word of God, it hasn�t changed, and it says, Hebrews 9, verse 22, �And almost all things are by the law purged with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no remission.� You cannot bypass the blood. You know I guess in my classes over the years I�ve always taught that there are two absolutes, at least a minimum. There are two absolutes that we can never fool with, we can never try to detour, we can never try to compromise, and we have to face them head on. This is the first one, that without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sin. The other one is in Hebrews 11, verse 6, that without faith it is impossible to please God. Now remember what that verse was? Oh let�s go back and look at it, because it�s the only way these things soak in. Go back to Romans chapter 3 again then, that with these two absolutes, and they�re both mentioned in the same verse, in Romans 3, verse 25, �Without the shedding of blood there is no remission, without faith it is impossible to please God.� So what do we have to do? We have to bring the two together, and here they are in one verse. �Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood.� There are the two of them, and you can�t separate them. Without the shedding of blood there is no remission, and without faith there is no salvation, and so you bring the two together. Now what is always my definition of faith? It�s taking God at His Word. That�s faith in the simplest definition, and yet it�s the most all-inclusive. That unless we can take God at His Word, we can�t get the first base with Him. He won�t hear us, and it�s always been by faith. What was the difference between Cain and Abel? Cain might have been a nicer guy than Abel, but what was Cain�s problem? He didn�t believe what God said. God said, �Bring Me a blood sacrifice, and I�ll accept you.� And Cain rationalized. On the way out a guy reminded me, and he said, �Do you know a good definition for rationalization?� And I said, �Well, I�ve got my own. What�s yours?� And he said, �Self-deception.� And I said, �Yeah, a good definition.� But Cain rationalized. He deceived himself, and he said, �Surely God will accept me without the blood.� But God didn�t. But Abel, on the other hand, did what God said to do. And then what does Hebrews 11 say? By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, his faith showing that he was doing what God said to do. And so Abel was accepted, and Cain was rejected. Now people are doing the same thing today. The human race hasn�t changed one iota. Not one iota. Mankind today is still rationalized, and they say, �But if I do this, or I do that, surely God will accept me.� No He won�t, because God says, �Unless I see faith, and unless I see the shed blood, I can�t pass over. I can�t redeem you. My hands are tied.� And so we have to recognize some of these basic truths, that when we place our faith in the shed blood, we have forgiveness. LES FELDICK MINISTRIES, ROUTE 1, BOX 760, KENTA, OK, 74552 Through the Bible with Les Feldick, is viewer supported, and your gift is appreciated. Thank you, and be sure to tune in next time, for Through the Bible with Les Feldick.