Thursday, August 5, 2010

The Blood

I’ve been studying the Blood of Jesus a lot lately. My understanding has been a progression over decades that took a giant leap recently.
Years ago I knew that His Blood was poured out for us from the Cross of Calvary and then He took some of it and put it on the heavenly Mercy Seat so our sins are covered from the sight of God the Father. I was very grateful. I was glad that the deal between Father and Son included “whosoever will believe.” I had a picture of myself eternally at the lower left hand corner of heaven on my knees scrubbing the floor – but grateful that I was in.

But then I discovered that Jesus and the Father are one. So I had to at least mentally recognize that the Father Himself loved me (for some strange reason). Maybe the blood of Jesus did something more than just cover my sin?

After that I found my favorite scripture verse I John 1:9 “If we confess our sins, He is faithful to forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” And then I realized from two verses earlier that it is His blood that does the cleansing. Hmm. The blood still at work for all these years? Literally doing a job? Cleansing away all unrighteousness from my soul when I see sin and confess it?

I’ve always said I don’t like the term ‘plead the blood’ because who are you pleading to? You don’t have to plead to God – He gave us the blood. You certainly don’t plead to the devil – he is overcome by it. They overcame him by the blood of the lamb and the word of their testimony. Rev. 12:11
But just two weeks ago I found out that the word plead is used in a legal sense. When you go before a judge, he/she says “How do you plead? Guilty or not guilty?” We don’t want to plead guilty. We can’t honestly plead not guilty. But we can plead the Blood of Jesus. It paid the price for what we owe Eternal Justice. What a relief! So before the Judge of the Universe when it comes to sin, ours and others, we plead the Blood. And He smiles because that’s the way He planned it.

But we shouldn’t plead the blood over the schemes of the devil. We should apply the Blood to situations that need redemption. And we should draw a Blood line around anything that needs protecting from the enemy. The Blood of Jesus empowers us beyond what most of us can imagine.

And what I’ve seen recently is that the Blood of Jesus is closely related to the Glory of God. The Bible tells us that the soul life is in the blood.(Lev. 17:14) Jesus’ blood contained His perfect soul life, His will constantly submitted to His Father, His Mind consistantly attuned to the Word of God, His emotions continually brought into harmony with Truth. That soul life is now available to you and me.

The Glory of God is His Presence manifested in and through us. We are changed from glory to glory into His image as we look at Jesus. (II Cor. 3:18) One degree of being like Him to a greater degree of being like Him.

The Glory of God is ours because we chose the Blood of Jesus to give us new life and allow that Blood to cleanse our souls from everything that is not like Jesus.

The Life and the Glory. The Blood and the Presence. Transformation - by spiritual Blood transfusion - until we are the glorious Church, spotless, with no wrinkle or blemish, holy as He is holy. (Ephesians 5:27) Praise the Lord!