CHRIST DEATH IS NECESSARY

When the priest in the Old Testament represented Israel before God he made the offerings by which fellowship was consummated and carried on between the people and God. So the priest, representing men before God, made the reconciling offerings. Just as the great offering that the Lord Jesus Christ made was a satisfaction, that is, he, in the gift of himself, satisfied God's requirements and his claims against us. His satisfaction anti-typically effected an expiation of sin. That is by what he did on the cross, sin was expiated, paid for. And God was propitiated, his holiness and righteousness satisfied, and by the death of Christ, the Father was rendered able, consistent with his perfections. That is, his perfections of mercy and holiness and justice, to reconcile us in mercy, to renew us, and to, finally, exalt us to the dignity, to the excellence, to the blessedness of the sons of God. So when we think of the Lord Jesus Christ as priest, we think of him as offering that offering, that satisfaction. Theologians for many centuries called it a satisfacio or the making of that which was sufficient. Satis in Latin means sufficient. Facio means to make. So satisfacio was the satisfaction, Christ's work by which he satisfied God's requirements for his people.

Now the apostles preached this fact, we believe. Paul said to the Corinthians, "I determine not to know anything among you save Jesus Christ, and him crucified." When Peter stood on the day of Pentecost in the city of Jerusalem by the temple he said,
"Men of Israel, listen to these words: Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs which God performed through Him in your midst, just as you yourselves know this Man, delivered up by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death."

That, of course, was the satisfacio, that is the satisfaction. And he says, "And God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for Him to be held in its power." Later when Peter writes his first epistle, in the very 1st chapter, he speaks again of this fact when he says, "Knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ." So Peter affirmed the same thing that Paul did. He affirmed the death of the Lord Jesus, and that it was the ground of the redemption of men.

When we turn to Revelation chapter 5 and verse 9 and 10 and read the vision that John has given us there in chapters 4 and 5, the climax of it is the statement in verse 9 and verse 10 in chapter 5, "And they sang a new song, saying, Worthy art Thou to take the book and to break its seals; for Thou wast slain, and didst purchase for God with Thy blood men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. Thou hast made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God; and they will reign upon the earth." So, it's quite clear that the apostles, Paul, Peter, and John, thought that the Lord Jesus had offered an offering by which men are brought into fellowship with the Lord God, and each one of them affirms the necessity of the death of the Lord Jesus for the accomplishment of that.