Jesus Died For Us
Jesus Died For Us
The good news of the gospel is that Christ died in the place of sinners. He took our penalty. (This is sometimes why this doctrine is referred to as penal, substitutionary atonement, referring to penalty.) “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree” (1 Peter 2:24). The central idea of the atonement is that it was for us:
“For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly” (Rom 5:6).
“But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom 5:8).
“Sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh” (Rom 8:3).
“He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all…” (Rom 8:32).
“Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures” (1 Cor 15:3).
“For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin” (2 Cor 5:21).
“…who gave himself for our sins…” (Gal 1:4).
“I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal 2:20).
“Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us…” (Gal 3:13).
“…as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God” (Eph 5:2).
“…who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness…” (Titus 2:14).
The simple truth of the gospel is that Jesus made full payment to God for all our sins and failures, and if we believe in Him and repent of our sins, then we will be saved. The late professor, J. Gresham Machen, powerfully summed up the doctrine of the atonement this way:
According to the Bible, all mankind, since the fall, is under the just condemnation of God’s law, subject to God’s wrath and curse, utterly unable to do any good. All mankind, in other words, is lost in sin. Being lost in sin, men have no right of access unto God. On the contrary they are separated from God by a flaming sword. They are under the awful penalty of God’s law, and if that penalty is treated as though it did not exist, God ceases to be God and evil has triumphed over good.
That, my friends, is the situation of fallen man. It is not presented to us just in one part of the Bible. It is presented to us in the whole Bible. From the first book of the Bible to the last, the Bible beats down men’s pagan optimism; it opposes the central article of the pagan creed, which is the article: “I believe in man.” It takes from us the last vestige of confidence that in ourselves we have any right of access unto God; it teaches us to fear the righteous God, and to stand in terror before the majesty of his offended law.
It teaches us, therefore, that if we are to have access unto God, it can only be through a priest. The priest must be one of us, since he is to be our representative; but he must also be more than merely one of us. If he were merely one of us, he would have no more right of access unto God than we have. Like us he would be a sinner, subject to God’s wrath and curse. But even if he were sinless, still if he were merely man he could not possibly bring us to God. Any sacrifice that he might offer for us, any punishment he might endure for a time in our stead, would, if he were merely man, have at best only a finite value. It could not possibly be accepted instead of the eternal punishment, which was the just penalty of the law upon our sin.
If we are to have truly a priest who can bring us to God, it can only be a one who is both man and God—man that he might suffer in our stead, God that his suffering in our stead might have worth enough to satisfy the law’s demands.
Such a priest, such a high priest, thank God, we have. It is Christ Jesus the Lord.
J. Gresham Machen, radio address, 1936. Philadelphia. Published in Things Unseen, 395-396.