Power Exchange: Part 2

Before we can fully understand the freedom given to us by Christ Jesus, you must understand the what was purchased on His cross.    When you begin to know the Truth, you will fall deeply in love with the Savior who already zealously and tenderly loves you.  It is at this place that you realize the freedom that is Jesus Christ.

It is not a pretty story, the story of Golgotha, where Jesus was crucified.  He was deeply distressed in the Garden of Gethsemane, knowing He would soon be arrested. He told Peter, James, and John who were with Him, that He was sorrowful to the point of death.  His anguish was so great, Luke tells us, that His sweat was like falling drops of blood.  Three times He asked God to release Him from this mission, ending each request with, “Nevertheless, not My will, but Your will be done.”  Meanwhile, His disciples, who Jesus had asked twice to watch and pray with Him, slept. (Matthew 26, Luke 22) 

When Jesus prayed “If possible, let this cup pass from Me…” it wasn’t as much about the brutal physicality of the cross as it was the heaviness of the sin that He alone would bear, that only He could bear.  The bodily torture He would face was an unthinkable burden to bear, but his grief was about something far deeper than physical pain, more than the knowledge that He would face the cross alone, that Judas would betray Him, His disciples would forsake Him, that Peter would deny Him.  There would be the moment while He hung in agony, beaten (Isaiah 52 tells us that His body was marred more than any man), crowned with thorns, and nailed to an unforgiving slab of wood, that He would become a curse for us.  The depths of Hell would reach up and place on Him the unimaginable weight of all sin, past, present, and future, and He would become all of the vile ugliness of the choices mankind had made and would make, even yours and mine, as he hung gasping for breath on the cross.  With Jesus becoming the sin of all mankind, God cursed Him, and the holy Father would have no choice but to withdraw because sin could not exist in God’s presence.  And God poured His wrath out on Jesus.   For the only time in His humanity, He would be without the Father.  Then, with the proclamation, “It is finished!” He committed His spirit into the hands of the Father, and died an innocent man for our guilt.   (John 19, Luke 23)

With those words, “It is finished,” not one more thing had to be done for our freedom, nothing more from Jesus, and certainly nothing from us.  The full price had been paid, bought with His blood.  Jesus had humbly and obediently completed everything necessary for our salvation and clear the way for us to boldly approach the throne of God’s grace.  The blood shed at Calvary is of much more value than anything we can name or desire, and all that it gives us cannot be fully realized with our human minds. 

When we accepted Jesus as our personal savior, His blood saved us from His wrath (Romans 5:9).  His blood redeems us, providing forgiveness and grace (Ephesians 1:7); and cleanses us from all sin (1 John 1:7). 

As if salvation wasn’t enough, His blood accomplishes even more!  It sets us free:

• John 8:36 AMP – So if the Son makes you free, then you are unquestionably free.
• 2 Corinthians 3:17 NKJV –  Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.  When we turn to the Lord, the veil of blindness is removed (verse 16) and we can see and reflect the glory of the Lord (verse 18).  The glory of the Lord knows no bondage!
• Romans 8:1 – There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.
• Galatians 5:1 NKJV – Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.  The NLT says it this way: “So Christ has truly set us free, now make sure you stay free…” 

How are we free?  By fully trusting in the cleansing, liberating power of the blood. But how do you do that when you are walking around in chains? We’ll talk about that real soon!