Lon Solomon Ministries
What Jesus Did
And let's take a Bible and open it together to the letter that Paul wrote to Church of Rome, Romans chapter 3 in the New Testament. Okay, well, as you know, we're in the middle of a series called spiritual boot camp and the purpose of this series is to kind of solidify the basics of what this thing that we call the Christian life. And in parts one through three, we talked about the veracity, the trustworthiness of the Bible and what that means for our lives. And then last week in part four, we talked about who is Jesus and we learned that he is Jehovah God wrapped in human flesh. And now we're to part five where we want to talk about, okay, if we understand who Jesus is, what did he do exactly for you and me and every person who's ever lived? Now friends, we cannot talk about what Jesus did for us and avoid talking about the blood of Jesus Christ which was shed on the cross. And there are lots of places in modern day Christianity, seminaries, Christian colleges, even churches where if I went in and said to them today, what I'm about to say to you, they would hoot and holler me right off the platform because in modern day Christianity, there has been a very deliberate move away from talking about the blood of Jesus Christ. People consider it too primitive, too gruesome, too unsophisticated. Critics refer to this as the gospel of gore, the cult of plasma, the antiderluvian, prehistoric they say. But friends, what the Bible tells us about Jesus Christ is not gruesome. It is not prehistoric and it is not primitive. What the Bible tells us about Jesus Christ is that his blood forms the basis of the best news ever delivered to the human race. And I hope by the time that we're done you'll agree with me that thank God for the blood of Jesus Christ, how dare we not talk about this when it forms the foundation of every bit of hope that we have as followers of Jesus Christ. So let's look in and talk about this. Our question for today then is, why isn't Jesus' life enough? Why aren't Jesus' teachings enough? Why aren't Jesus' principles and ethics enough? What is so special about the blood of Jesus Christ? Now before we can answer that question, we first have to talk about what the problem is, because friends, the blood of Jesus Christ is a remedy for a problem. It's a prescription for a disease and if we don't understand the disease, if we don't understand the problem, we'll never appreciate the remedy like we should. So first of all, what is the problem that the blood of Jesus Christ is meant to fix? Well, the problem is right here in Romans chapter 3 where I ask you to turn. Verse 23 of chapter 3, here's what it says, it says, "For all of us have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God." Here in America when we use the word sin, or we use the word sinner, it's a very harsh word. That word is reserved in America for reference to the grossest, most awful things, but friends really in the Bible, that's not the truth. The word sin in the Bible has a very simple meaning. It simply means literally to miss the mark. It means to shoot and miss the bull's eye, miss the target. That's all it means. And what the Bible is telling us here in this verse is that the bull's eye that we're trying to hit, that we're aiming at, is the glory of God, God's perfect holy nature, perfect holiness in our every action, our every deed, our every word, and our every thought. And what the Bible is saying here is that you and I may shoot at this target with all of our good works, with all of our religious activity, with all of our kind deeds, we shoot at it over and over again, but we constantly miss every one of us misses. This past summer my wife, Brendan, I had the chance to get away for a little R&R, and we were out on the West Coast, we were in Vancouver, British Columbia, and that area, and we went one night into a little restaurant to have dinner, and it was kind of one of these English-type little restaurants, and while we were waiting for the food, they had a dart board there. So I said to Brendan, come on, let's throw some darts, and she's like, what? And I'm like, no, no, no, come on, let's throw some darts, this will be fun. So we got behind the line, I don't know how far the line is back, 8, 12 feet, whatever it is, and we started throwing darts, you say, well, how'd y'all do? Well, let's just say this, I never knew how well darts stick in wall board till we did this. We were terrible, we were awful, we stumped the place up. We probably did this for 20 minutes or more, never, ever hit the bull's eye, never even got close, we're happy if we even hit anywhere on the target, whatever, this is hard, this isn't easy to do this thing, and so it wasn't that we weren't trying hard, it wasn't that we weren't sincere, it wasn't that we weren't dedicated to trying to get it right, we just weren't capable of putting that dart in the bull's eye. Friend, what the Bible is telling us is that when it comes to hitting God's target, every human being alive is like Brenda and me throwing darts. Not that we're not trying is just we're not able to get it done. Now this doesn't mean that we're all terrible people with dismembered body parts and some refrigerator in the basement in our house or anything like that. All this means is we miss the target, we are target misters. You say, well, golly, Lon, to be a target, mister, it doesn't sound nearly as bad as that other word you use, I mean target, mister, gosh, I think I'm okay with that, that's not so bad, what's the problem with being a target mister? Well, well, well, there are a couple problems. The Bible says that if you and I are a target mister, there are two penalties that we incur as target misters. The first one is an earthly penalty, namely an unconnectedness, a disconnectedness, a break in our relationship with Almighty God. Ephesians chapter 2 verse 1 says that every human being comes into this world, born dead born unresponsive, born a cadaver in their trespasses and their sins. The earthly penalty that target misters suffer from is that we are spiritually dead. We are disconnected from God. We have lifeless dormant spirits. We have no personal relationship, no personal intimacy or no personal connection with God, which is why God feels so far away, so distant, so remote, but you know friends, this isn't the way God designed us to live. God built us as human beings to be connected to him. He designed us to be connected in our spirit with his spirit so that trying to run life without a personal relationship with Christ is like trying to run an engine with no spark plugs. It's unnatural, it's unworkable and it's unsatisfying. It just is not the way we were made to be. I kind of like Billy Joel, I don't know if you all are a fan of Billy Joel, but he did a song a few years ago called "River of Dreams" and in his song, the song is about his quest, his search, to try to find this thing inside of him that he felt was missing. In fact, he doesn't even know what it is that's missing, but he just knows something's not right. Something is absent that ought to be there. One of the stanzas says, "Still searching for something, something deep in my soul, something I'd never lose, something somebody stole." And at the end of the song, he still doesn't know exactly what he's looking for, the search goes on. And friends with Billy Joel's looking for is exactly what we're talking about. What he senses is missing in his life is that connection with God, that relationship with God, that God designed Billy Joel and every other human being to have and without it inside, way down deep, our souls testify to us, something horrible is missing here. Now if you're here and you've never trusted Jesus Christ in a real and personal way, maybe you feel like that. I mean, maybe your head tells you, "Oh no, don't listen to that. You're fine. We're all fine. Everything's good." But when you're alone and you're really quiet and you listen to your heart, you know, something's just not right down there and you don't know what you're missing either. You can't put your finger on it, but it's like a cosmic kind of loneliness down in there somewhere. And I'm here to tell you, you're missing the same thing, Billy Joel's missing. You're missing that intimate personal connectedness with your Creator, but I got some great news for you. The good news is this is fixable. The good news is we got a remedy to this that works when we come into personal relationship with Jesus Christ, we get reconnected with Him and this works all of a sudden. So if you're here and you've never trusted Jesus Christ, I'm telling you what's on the other side of that is fixing that thing that you're sensing way down deep inside of you, that absence from God, Jesus will fix it if you'll just give your life to it. Now there's another penalty that we suffer from being target misters, and that's just not an earthly penalty, it's an eternal penalty. It's not just alienation from God in this life, but it's permanent separation from God in the life to come. Psalm 316, "For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son that whoever believes in His Son should not perish but should have eternal life." And the key word for our discussion here today is the word perish. God tells us in this verse that if we go out of this world as target misters, we are going to perish, we are going to go to a place where we are going to be separated from God and everything good and everything holy forever a place the Bible calls hell. Now the Bible doesn't see hell as a concept or a legend, it doesn't mean that you work for a boss like in Dilbert, no, no, no, much more serious than that. This is a literal place, a physical place that exists, a place where the graces of love and mercy and compassion and beauty and kindness are absent, and a place worst of all where there is no parole ever, ever. Now this is the eternal destiny of every target, if you leave this world as a target mister in the sight of God, this is what's going to happen. And so here's our problem, we have a two-fold problem, alienation from God in this life and permanent separation from God in the life to come. And what Jesus did, remember that's what we're here to talk about. What Jesus did is Jesus shed his blood on the cross to provide a solution to our two-fold problem. He said, "Well on, I don't get it, how exactly does Jesus' blood shed on the cross solve my problem?" Well that's a great question, let's answer it. And the best way to answer it is to go back and look at a beautiful illustration of how this works from the events of the Jewish feast of Passover. So I want to ask you to turn in your Bible back to the second book of the Bible, Exodus chapter 11. If you're using our copy of the Bible it's page 47, page 47, Exodus 11, and let me tell you what's going on here as you turn. God has said to nine different times to your Brenner, "Let my people go." And nine different times He has responded and said, "Forget it, it's not happening, not in this life, who is this Lord that I should let His people go? Get out of here!" And so now God's fed up, His patience is exhausted, and that's where we pick up the story. And there are three important things here we need to recognize. Number one, we need to see that God is the God of justice. God is patient. He'll put up with a lot for a long time, but at some point when there is disregard, when there is disobedience, when there is defiance, at some point God is going to enforce justice. Chapter 11 of Exodus, look what He says. Verse 1, "Now the Lord has said to Moses, 'I will bring one more plague on Pharaoh and on Egypt, and after that He will let you go.'" Verse 4. So Moses said, "This is what the Lord says He's going to do. Now midnight, I will go throughout Egypt, and every firstborn son in Egypt will die. From the firstborn son of Pharaoh, who sits on the throne, to the firstborn son of the slave girl, who's at her hand mill, and all the firstborn of the cattle is well, there will be loud wailing throughout Egypt worse than has ever been or will ever be again." God says, "I am a God of justice, and at some point I enforce justice." Now the next thing that we see from here is that God is also a God of mercy. And as a God of mercy, God made a way out. He made a way of deliverance from this awful penalty He was going to enforce, which leads us to our third and final thing we want to see, which is that God's way of deliverance here centered around a blood covering. Look at Exodus 12, verse 3, "Tell the whole community of Israel," God says, "that on the tenth day of the month each man is to take a lamb for his family," verse 5, "and the animals you choose must be year old males without defect," verse 6, "taken hold them till the fourteenth day of the month of Nisan on which day you are to slaughter them at twilight," verse 7, "and then you are to take some of their blood and put it on the sides of your door and the top of your door frame in the house where you're going to eat that lamb and be that night," verse 12, "because on that same night I will pass through Egypt and I will strike down every firstborn, both men and animals, and I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt for I am the Lord," verse 13, "and the blood will be a sign, will be a shield, will be a protection for you on the houses where you are, and when I see a blood I will pass over, therefore the name of the holiday, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you if you're inside a house with blood on it when I strike Egypt." Now friends, notice some things here about this Passover lamb. The Passover lamb had to be perfect, blemishless, verse 5, "it had to be killed on the fourteenth day of Nisan," verse 6, "none of its bones could be broken," verse 46, "we did it in read it, but you can check that out," but most important of all, the crucial element of the Passover lamb was the blood covering that it provided. The blood of that lamb was to be put on the doorpost of the Israelites houses and it would serve as a shield, a protector, a covering against this tenth plague and the only people. That night in Egypt who would be safe and delivered would be the people who would be hiding behind taking refuge behind this blood covering because listen to the promise of God when I see what? The blood I will pass over you. Now isn't it interesting God didn't say when I see that you're Israelites, when I see that you're synagogue members, when I see that you've been bar mitzvot, when I see that you're trying hard to be good people, when I see that you're giving a lot of money to the synagogue, God didn't say any of that. God said when I see the blood, that's the issue, I will pass over you. God's way of deliverance had nothing to do with race, nationality, religion, education, good works, religious activity, socioeconomic standing or recycling. Nothing to do with any of that. The only thing it had to do with was who was hiding behind the blood and you know what? If an Egyptian had taken refuge in a house with blood on it that night, his firstborn son would have been spared just like the Israelites because the issue was not whether you were in Egyptian or in Israelite, it was when I see the blood. That's the issue. Friends, how does all this relate to what Jesus did? Well let me share a verse of Scripture with you, 1 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 7. Look at this verse, it says for Jesus, for Christ, our Passover Lamb has been sacrificed for us. It's an incredible statement, Jesus is our Passover Lamb. You say what does that mean? Well it's very simple, it's very easy to understand it when we compare Jesus to the original Passover Lamb. He was a male, just like that lamb. He was a perfect, he was blemishless because Hebrews chapter 4 verse 15 says he was tempted in every way as we are yet without sinning. He was killed and you may not realize this, the day Jesus was killed on the cross was the 14th day of Nissan, the exact same day that the Passover Lamb was killed, very interesting. And not a bone in his body was broken, John chapter 19 is very specific about that because he was the Passover Lamb. That couldn't happen, but most important of all is that Jesus' blood shed on the cross is the ultimate and final blood covering for you and me to hide behind when we as target misters take refuge behind the blood of Jesus when we hide behind it from the judgment of God just the way those Israelites hid behind the blood of that literal original Passover Lamb back in Egypt. The Bible says that we are protected from God's judgment in the very same way those Israelites were protected because friends the promise of God still stands today when I see the blood I will Passover you except that now the blood we are talking about is not the blood of some literal lamb we go out in the street and kill. That was only a symbol, that was only meant to be a pointer to the real lamb of God, Jesus himself, now it's the blood of the Messiah himself, the blood of Almighty God himself wrapped in human flesh shed on the cross that you and I are hiding behind, blood that the Bible calls better blood than the blood of the Passover Lamb, the blood of Almighty God himself. They say, Lon, okay, I understand what you're saying, but you know aren't you reading a little bit much into that one verse Christ our Passover Lamb has been sacrificed for us, seems like to me you're making that verse walk on all fours friend and pulling an awful lot out of that thing I mean about the blood of Jesus, well let's see what else does the Bible have to say because friends the Bible is full of comments about the blood of Jesus Christ that point to write what I'm telling you. For example let's go down and walk a little bit through these John 1 John chapter 1 verse 7 the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin the Bible says Hebrews chapter 9 verse 12 by his own blood he Jesus obtained eternal redemption for us. First Peter chapter 1 verse 18 and 19 for you were not redeemed from your empty way of life with perishable things like silver and gold but with the precious blood of Christ a lamb without blemish or defect Matthew 26 verse 28 if the last suffer Jesus said this is my blood that I'm offering which is poured out for many people why for the forgiveness of sin Colossians chapter 1 verse 14 in Jesus Christ we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of sin Revelation chapter 5 verse 9 calls Jesus the one who loved us and freed us from our sins how by his blood while Romans chapter 5 verse 9 we have been justified the Bible says we have been declared innocent we have been declared right in the G-site of Almighty God even his target misters how by Jesus's blood and Romans chapter 3 verse 25 says we get a tome and for our sins how through faith by relying on the blood of Jesus and this is just a smattering of what's in the Bible is in any wonder then that John the Baptist turned to Jesus and pointed at him John chapter 1 and said behold the lamb of God the Passover lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world by friends the Bible's airtight there is only one basis on which God deals with target misters only one and that basis is not good works church membership baptism or being a nice person that basis is not trying to keep the Ten Commandments saying the rosary doing your best or being as good as the God next to you that basis is not being bar mittsford or being confirmed or anything else there's nothing wrong with a lot of these things but that's not how God deals with target misters he deals with them on only one basis and it's the basis he's always dealt with them and that's the basis of a blood covering it started with Adam and Eve and then it went to Cain and Abel and then it went to Passover and then it went to the temple sacrifices and it culminated with Jesus Christ God system has never changed it's a blood covering and it's all about you and me how do we do this how do we get this hey it's all about you and me abandoning any other remedy every other remedy we've ever trusted to pay for our sin and make us right with a holy God and instead taking refuge hiding behind claiming as our shield and protector the blood of Jesus just like these Hebrews took refuge behind the blood of that Passover lamb thirty five hundred years ago friends this is so easy it's so simple that even a child can do it my son Jamie who's now twenty three did this when he was three years old and it's stuck he's still a follower of Christ today and we're the ones who make this hard why would God want to make this hard God wants to be in relationship with you and me God wants you and me to be with him forever in eternity why would he make it hard we make it hard we walk around and go I couldn't be that easy I mean it's got me walk on me I mean she can't be that well who said it can't be that easy God says it is that easy it's simple and the reason God made it simple is because he wants you and me to do it now that's as far as we want to go and I hope what we've done today is give you a little more clearer understanding of what it was you did as a follower of Jesus Christ what the dynamics really were when you trusted Christ as your savior what really happened you abandoned everything else you ever trusted to make you right in the sight of God and hid behind the blood of Jesus hope you understand that better now but we still have a really important question asked and you know what our question is is everybody ready I mean y'all look a little catatonic on me here you everybody ready all right everybody ready one two three right you say Lon so what I'm a follower of Jesus Christ I understand this I've done this and I'm okay with this and and so I mean this is interesting what you said what difference does this make to my life Monday to Saturday to go through this again I know all of this okay well wonderful wonderful but let me tell you what Job said Job said Job 14 one man born of woman is a few days and full of trouble now I don't know about you but this is definitely true of me I got trouble in my life I bet you got trouble too but I got trouble I got trouble with my eyes I can't read the big signs on the beltway like I used to be able to they're all just a big blur he said well I didn't know you wore glasses I don't and I'm not going to I'm just too vain I would look like Mr. Magoo and I'm not doing this so I'm just going to squint and see him as best I can but I got trouble with my eyes I got trouble with my washing machine we got a new washing machine three and a half weeks ago when they brought it my wife said I'm a throw a load in she was leaving she said now before you leave since this is brand-new is down the basement you check it I'm like yeah yeah yeah whatever so she left and I was getting ready to leave and I thought well you know I better go down there and check it because I know she's going to ask me if I did it so I went down there and checked it and guess what the valve that cuts the water off when it fills was broken we didn't know this and it never cut off that baby was just filling and filling it would water all over the floor about an inch and a half of water all over the floor can you imagine if I would have left what would have happened I wouldn't have been as much afraid of the water as my wife I got problems with my washing machine in the park to fix it is on back order and still isn't here three and a half weeks later I got trouble with my washing machine I got trouble with my car my clutch went out I barely even got to the repair shop I'm stripping the gears with the clutch completely in because it won't disengage I mean it's it's tough driving on the belt way in second gear you know what I'm saying that's hard and I got trouble with my car I got trouble with my computer printer I can't get this thing to work right and I've tried kicking it and that didn't help so I don't know what else to do to it I got trouble with my credit card company they keep sending me a bill for something I don't even have I never even bought and I keep calling and telling them I don't have this I don't own this I never have owned it I never purchased it and then they say okay fine we'll take care of it next month it's back on the bill and they write me letters say we're going to ding your credit report and I got trouble with my credit card company I got trouble with my little girl my little girl spent most of yesterday afternoon and evening in the emergency room she had fifteen grand mal seizures in eighteen hours because she got sick and that often pushes her over the edge and it was a hard day yesterday I got trouble with my little girl what did Job say Job said we're full of trouble and I'll bet you you're like I am it seems like as soon as you get through dealing with one set of trouble you got more trouble now as a follower of Jesus Christ friends with everything that can go wrong in this world isn't it wonderful to have one thing you don't have any trouble with isn't it wonderful to have one thing that can't go wrong isn't it wonderful to have one piece of something that you can go to that won't let you down won't change won't give you a hard way to go you never have to fix and I got to tell you there are times when I drop on my knees and say God you know what everything else in my life is a complete uproar right now I got to go back to ground zero here and just remind myself that when all of this trouble is over and I leave this life I got one thing that's never going to let me down and that's the blood of Jesus Christ now I'll tell you for me that helps me bring some hope back to my life that helps bring some joy back to my life it helps bring some perspective and helps me get back up off my knees and go out and deal with all this trouble because I got an anchor for my soul I've got a I got a piece of the rock that's never going to change here and if you're a follower of Jesus Christ it's wonderful if you know everything we've already said here but knowing it's one thing using it every day in your life is different and God wants us to use this information to use it to bring hope and encouragement and to lift ourselves up when everything else in our life seems to be in trouble to remind ourselves that the blood Jesus shed on the cross to reconcile us with God to give us an eternal destiny with God that that is that blood covering will never ever give you any trouble it will never be a problem you will never have to fix it and it will never let you down there's at least one thing in life that you can count on now I don't know about you man but that helps me and I hope you'll use it to help you when every day everything's going wrong in your day hey there's still one thing going right and that is the blood of Jesus Christ let's pray together Lord Job was right this world is full of trouble and just because we're followers of Jesus Christ doesn't in any way mean that we don't have a lot of that trouble we do and Lord in the middle of of all kinds of problems and difficulties it's sometimes really easy to lose our joy to lose our hope to get discouraged to feel depressed but God I thank you for reminding us today that there is one thing in our life as a follower of Christ they will never give us trouble that will never let us down that we will never have a problem with and that's the blood of Jesus Christ and the covering the safe place he made for us behind the blood of Jesus Christ so Lord may that be an anchor for our souls may that be a source of hope and joy and encouragement even in the middle of the worst day to know that there is one thing and it's the best thing in the universe that we have that will never ever let us down Lord thank you for loving us like this we don't know why you did but we sure are glad you love us like this and thanks for creating a Passover lamb for us whose blood we can hide behind and you will pass over us we love you for doing that Lord in Jesus name we pray and God's people said amen good to have you you here, bless you guys. 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