[0:00] I'm going to sing now some verses from Psalm 72. Psalm 72 at verse 9.
[0:15] They in the wilderness that dwell bow down before him must, and they that are his enemies shall lick the very dust. The kings of Tarshish and the isles to him shall presents bring.
[0:30] And unto him shall offer gifts, Sheba's and Theba's king. Yea, all the mighty kings on earth before him down shall fall, and all the nations of the world do service to him shall.
[0:45] For he the needy shall preserve when he to him doth call. The poor also unto him that hath no help of man at all. The poor man and the indigent in mercy he shall spare.
[0:58] He shall preserve alive the souls of those that needy are. For from deceit and violence their soul he shall set free.
[1:09] And in his sight fight precious and dear their blood shall be. These verses of Psalm 72 at verse 9.
[1:20] They in the wilderness that dwell bow down before him must. Be in the wilderness that dwell bow down before him must.
[1:43] And in the wilderness that dwell bow down before him must. And in the wilderness that dwells in the wilderness that dwells with us.
[2:03] The kings of God should shine the aisles to him shall bless the train.
[2:18] And I should have shall not clear shifley's 으 art and sin ase wasoarding.
[2:36] Yea, all the mighty kings on earth before them died shall fall.
[2:53] And all the nations of the world to set this true child.
[3:09] For he shall be there when we do end up all.
[3:28] The pure of soul until the time no help of man at all.
[3:46] The pure man of the image and the mercy he shall fear.
[4:03] He shall be there by the souls of those that near are.
[4:21] Both throngly sick and violent, their soul he shall be.
[4:37] And in his night bright precious and dear their blood shall be.
[4:56] I'd like us now for a short time turn to the first epistle, General of Peter, chapter 1.
[5:10] And we can read again at verse 18. For as much as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a land without blemish and without sport.
[5:35] Particularly the words, but with the precious blood of Christ.
[5:48] We know that the apostle Peter has written this epistle to a group of believers described to us in the opening verses.
[6:06] An apostle of Jesus Christ, an apostle of Jesus Christ, an apostle of Jesus Christ, who the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, Bithynia, and so on.
[6:20] They are strangers of the diaspora. Believers who have suffered persecution and have had to flee from their homes.
[6:32] Believers who have suffered persecution and have had to flee from their homes. I can't but think of them when we see on our televisions pictures and images of men, women, and children who are driven from their homes.
[6:49] And forced to find some succor or solace elsewhere than their own home lands.
[7:02] They are driven by persecution, driven by the influence of war, sometimes famine, and a whole host of different things.
[7:15] But their experience is there for us to see. And that's the kind of experience that those people that the apostle is writing to had.
[7:27] May be different in various ways. But they are strangers where they should be at home.
[7:41] They are without many creature comforts because their enemies are many and they have deprived them of what we would call their basic human rights.
[7:56] The purpose of the apostle in writing this epistle to them is that their faith would not fail them. That it would be strengthened through the word that he sends to them.
[8:10] And his words are to be an encouragement to them. But I want us to think very specifically about the words that we read there from verse 19.
[8:27] First of all, think of the preciousness of the blood. Secondly, the purchasing power of the blood.
[8:41] Thirdly, peace by way of the blood. And fourthly, the cleansing power of the blood. Or pollution removed by the blood.
[8:54] Four headings. Just a few general thoughts arising out of that. It's a familiar passage to you all, I'm sure. And a passage that is something, a place that we turn to frequently, such as the subject matter offered.
[9:19] But a question for you. What do you think makes the blood precious to the apostle? Where do you think his mind gravitates to when he speaks of the precious blood of Christ?
[9:41] What makes it precious to him? And I suppose the most obvious answer would be the outcome in his own experience of the application of the blood.
[10:01] I think it could be that like ourselves, we could think of the blood of Christ being precious to us because of the benefits that arose through it.
[10:21] And why wouldn't it be precious to us? Because of that. Why wouldn't we consider the blood of Christ?
[10:33] And suppose, it goes without saying, and I'm sure you understand it, that when we're talking about the blood of Christ, we're not talking about the literal blood that floats through his veins.
[10:47] I'm sure you're well enough taught to know that when Peter or Paul or John talks about the blood of Christ, that they're actually speaking about his death on the cross and what it means to them.
[11:08] So when it is talking about the blood of Christ, it could be that the death of Christ as they have derived benefits from it could be something that they could identify as being precious.
[11:33] But we need to I think explore it further because it's not just simply a matter of that.
[11:45] If we if we read into the context in which these words are found, it is clear that that is part of what the apostle has to say.
[11:57] He's speaking to the church, he's speaking to the believers, he's speaking to those who have faith in Christ. Elect according to the foreknowledge of God through sacrification of the Spirit and to obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ and so on.
[12:15] But I think we understand that while the blood of Christ is shorthand for the sacrificial death of Christ and we we have to understand that the scripture requires us to think of his death as nothing other than sacrificial.
[12:44] That when we come across every time that it refers to the death of Christ or the blood of Christ that there is an understanding undergirding it that it was indeed sacrificial that it does indeed direct us to the liturgy and the past practices of the church where animals were brought to be slain and their blood sacrificed.
[13:18] But he is not just thinking of animal sacrifice he is thinking of a very specific sacrifice a very specific death a very specific shedding of blood and that is the shedding of the blood of the Son of God and that was the first area where the preciousness of the blood must be understood.
[13:52] very fair to the words of the apostle Paul in his letter to the Ephesians he teaches the church there as to their how they are to live their lives in the world.
[14:13] He says walk in love as Christ also has loved us and has given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savour.
[14:29] Now that again confirms the idea that the death of Christ is indeed sacrificial. It seems plain enough.
[14:42] However the language that is used is language that requires us to think of the offerings of the Old Testament.
[14:55] The animal that is slaughtered, the body that is slain, that is laying on the altar and the blood applied.
[15:07] That is part of the image but if you incorporate it into that, that image and the image of the Son of God whose blood is applied, whose body is slain, whose body is placed on the altar.
[15:29] Principal MacLeod goes as far as to say and many find fault with him for saying as much. He says it is the blood of the Son of God which is given.
[15:42] The very blood of God and as such it is unique and precious. It's as if that statement according to the understanding of some is going beyond what we meant to understand by it.
[16:03] The blood of God. It's alright for us to think of the blood of Christ but then to speak of it as the blood of God it seems that it's adding a greater meaning to it.
[16:23] But when we understand that the emphasis of the Apostle Peter is on the preciousness of the blood and the preciousness of the blood has in the first instance to do with the person whose blood it is.
[16:40] If I take it from a different angle if I refer you back to the occasion where Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane and if you remember when he was in the Garden of Gethsemane he was doing business with heaven as he prepared to go to the cross.
[17:04] he is there in labour as it were.
[17:14] He is crying out to his heavenly father and we have a picture given to us from the gospels of the depth from which the groanings of his soul come.
[17:37] It seems that he is on the very point of exhaustion. An angel from heaven is sent to strengthen him. We read in Luke's account being in an agony he prayed more earnestly and the sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling to the ground.
[18:02] And on one level you are impressed with this image of fragility and weakness. Such is the pressure under which he has put himself at that moment.
[18:18] that God sees fit to minister to him from heaven itself. But almost immediately according to John's account after this encounter with God in prayer and the strengthening that he experiences soldiers come into the garden and they speak to him.
[18:52] And he asks them who do you seek? Who do you seek? And you remember the reply that he gives. I am he according to our version I am he.
[19:10] Now if you look at your Bible in your English version the word he is in italics and that itself is something that we can't overlook because when he utters the words I am and the effect that it has on the soldiers or the people who come to them is such that they prostrate themselves in his presence.
[19:40] And Professor Furnesson has something very interesting to say about this as soon as he had said I am they went backward and fell to the ground on that occasion it was I am that spoke the fellow of Jehovah the one who even then stood by him thrown face to face in equal deity and at the announcement of the divine name the disclosure of the divine majesty an outburst of power rushed through his manhood and they were broken men.
[20:27] Now why do I emphasise that? Because it is so easy for us to overlook the fact that although he is the son of God and his humanity is before us too often his deity is hidden from view and it is not something that we consider and yet it is that very thing that we are confronted with in the consideration that Peter gives to him of the preciousness of his blood and that's the point that I want to make at the very outset when we consider the blood of the son of God it is the blood of the son of God and because it is it is the precious blood of the son of God the lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world the second thing we have is the purchasing power of the blood for as much as you know that you were not redeemed with corruptible things as silver and gold from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers but with the precious blood of
[21:51] Christ the words there are telling us that the blood of Christ was what redeemed not silver and not gold it reminds us that redemption was necessary it reminds us that redemption was at the heart of the sacrificial death of Christ and it was because the blood was precious most precious that redemption is possible the word that is connected here with the sacrificial nature of the death of Christ must always be associated with it is a word that tells us that when
[22:52] Christ died he he was dying to pay a ransom for many and without that being present the death of Christ is not as significant or as efficacious or as important to the believer it can't be but because it is a ransom price being settled being paid through the death of the cross then the preciousness of the blood is highlighted once again according to the scripture the redemption of sinners is what Christ came into the world to do he came to seek and to save the lost he could not seek and save the lost without redeeming them without paying the ransom price because as sinners their souls were forfeited they were destined to enter into an eternity under the condemnation of a just and a holy
[24:05] God Charles Hodge in his commentary on Ephesians he says there according to the teaching that the scripture sets before us it is always deliverance by ransom deliverance by ransom not by power not by truth but by blood again if you quote the words of Ephesians Jesus Christ in whom we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace and the price required is specified nothing less than the price specified would satisfy again let me quote
[25:08] Professor McLeod sin is the disease Christ is the remedy the more we reflect on our plight the more we see its gravity the more we see its gravity the more we see the glory of God's deliverance through the gospel of his grace is that true is it true for you is it true for myself I remember when I first began to follow the Lord I was aware of some people who were often in the services of God's house and their cheeks seldom remained dry from one end of the service to the other they wept copious floods of tears and it was a constant and you know you ask the question and I didn't ask the question often it wasn't my business but was the were the tears because of their own awareness of their sinfulness or because of their awareness of the preciousness of the preciousness of the blood that made their own sin be dealt with and for that reason
[26:43] Christ was precious can you follow that can you understand it maybe it was true for you I think we live in a time where we already heard it mentioned in prayer and I'm glad I heard it mentioned the hardness of our heart certainly my heart hard and I wonder when I've ever when recently I've been moved to shed tears into the gospel and it's the same gospel the same Christ the same needs are set before us but our hardness of heart is something that is clearly obvious certainly as far as I'm concerned you speak for yourself the third thing we have here is peace by way of the blood you're aware of passages in the scripture that remind you of how peace is secured with God through the blood of
[27:56] Jesus Christ in Paul's epistle to the Romans he says in chapter 5 therefore being justified by faith we have peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ in Colossians chapter 1 verse 20 for it pleased the father that in him should all fullness dwell and having made peace through the blood of his cross by him to reconcile all things unto himself in these two verses you're reminded by the apostle of something that cannot happen without the blood of Christ being made available without the sacrificial death of Christ you cannot I cannot make peace with God we cannot expect ourselves to experience the benefits of salvation apart from
[29:00] Christ the offence of sin can only be removed or dealt with by way of Christ as it is clearly and variously put in the scriptures there is only one source of reconciliation and that is by the blood of the cross I was reading with William Hendrickson in his commentary I think it was to Colossians I'm not sure one of the commentaries a series of New Testament commentaries and yet an interesting slant I took note of it because of the way that it applies I suppose to our own day he said this through Christ and his cross the universe is brought back or restored to its proper relationship to God in the sense that as a just reward for his obedience
[30:06] Christ was exalted to his father's right hand from which position of power and authority he rules the entire universe in the interest of the church and the glory of God now that Hendrickson has been dead a long time well a fairly long time and certainly what we're hearing today about the cosmic effect of environmental carelessness is on the mind certainly Christ doesn't come into their thinking and that's something that is clearly overlooked but what Hendrickson is saying look don't overlook this the precious blood of
[31:11] Christ ensures that Christ has been placed at the right hand of God that this is his rightful position and it is his rightful role to have power and government over this world to rule the entire universe in the interests of the church and the glory of God and you look at this thinking of many today and God doesn't come into it Christ doesn't come into it the death of Christ the life of Christ whatever doesn't come into it but the scripture requires us to remember it because such is the precious nature of the death of Christ and the precious blood of Christ that we can't forget it the most important thing to reckon with and to have in a reckoning is this that it is only by way of Christ and for us all it means the best of things in Hebrews chapter 10 verse 19 following having therefore brethren boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of
[32:32] Jesus by a new and living way which he has consecrated for us through the veil that is to see his flesh having a high priest over the house of God let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith having your heart sprinkled from an evil conscience our bodies washed with pure water let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering for he is faithful like promised Christ think as I write Tom McLeod he was saying when we're thinking about the preciousness of the blood of Christ not only do we think of a sacrifice we think of the work of redemption we don't just stop at the work of redemption we think of the work of sanctification we think of the church being brought into the presence of Christ finally and fully and without one missed finally and briefly it is by the way of the blood of
[33:33] Jesus that the stain of our sins is cleansed completely and utterly we believe that do we not we believe that Christ has dealt with our sin and yet it is the hardest thing for us to be confronted by our sin daily constantly we want to believe that Christ has dealt with it and so we should but still it rises its ugly head and it shows itself in our life in all manner of ways but as the apostle John says the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin all sin an old scotch divine said the following there is no sinner who is too bad there is no no heart that is too hard there is no life that is too marred there is no soul that has gone too far away from
[35:00] Christ that cannot be brought back when you think of the saints of the church that are written about in the old testament in the new testament when you think of the of the reformed church the saints that are identified there be it a John Newton be it a John John Bunyan or be it a John Smith be it yourself or myself because the precious blood of Christ is precious not just to my eyes and you eyes but to the eyes of God and all of the blood then we are assured that what God has sought to accomplish by it will indeed be fully realized without exception and may
[36:02] God add his blessing to these few thoughts let us pray Lord make the blood of Christ precious to us as we see it as the holy blood of God as we see it in something that cannot otherwise be true how can God have flesh and blood death you are you are spirit you are infinite eternal unchangeable in your being all the attributes that we could possibly mention that are divine and yet God became man and so was and continues to be God and man in one person forever we give thanks for the scripture that teaches us that and teaches us that this is something that had to happen in order that our sin be dealt with we give thanks for the Christ of which it speaks we pray that you would grant to us access to his presence a desire to be near him and to be like him and to live our lives for him cleansed from sin in his name amen of closing psalms in gaelic going to sing the last two verses of psalm 116 psalm 116 at verse 17 amenつ mon diem
[37:54] Let me Buffergue Thank you.
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[40:40] Thank you. Thank you.