UNDERSTANDING SALVATION - PART 3

THE WORK OF REDEMPTION

Bravo! Jesus Christ has saved the world from Sin, Death and Satan.

You see how we call it? The FINISHED WORK OF REDEMPTION or we say THE FINISHED WORK OF THE CROSS.

Note that it is a work. Jesus Christ has done the work than man was supposed to do. He has not just done the work; he has also finished all the work necessary for the salvation of man.

The work of redemption is what Jesus Christ did thousands of years ago, to save humanity from damnation and from the power of Satan.

Remember how that humanity was under the dominion of Sin. Humanity could not help themselves.  Sin reigned from the first man Adam to Moses. Then God decided to introduce the law to his people in order for them to know how wretched they were and how important it is for them to be saved. 

Before the time of Moses, there was no law. Everyone was doing what was right in their sight. God also did not impute sin, that is, God did not hold anyone guilty at that time. This is because where there is no law, there is no sin. There was nothing God could use to judge them. There was no standard for righteousness. Everyone that sinned during that period sinned and went away with it. Although the wages of sin had always been death. Even though God did not judge them, they received the consequences for their sins. Their minds also judged them. This is because they had eaten from the tree of good and evil. So man knows what was good and what was evil. God needs not to inform man again of whatever they do, whether it was good or evil. The faculty of man which is the soul man had become the ruler of man after the fall. The spirit man died. By “death” we do not mean extinction, we mean dormancy. The spirit of a man became useless; it could not perform its function anymore. Note that the spirit of man is the faculty of man that was connect to the Godhead, it is the real man made by God. So, after the fall, the Soul man became the steering of man. And since the mind is the central part of the soul, man could only reason according to his senses and do the good they can. However, the goodness of man was foolishness to God. Since Sin was reigning in the body of the man through the soul. Man was helpless.

So Israelites were given the law. Remember how we have established that God chose Israel to become the channel into achieving a family of his. So God saw how humanity had been too sinful and captive under the chains of sin and death. God came to the rescue of humanity, but he had to start with his people – Israel. God gave the Israelites the law through an Angel.

The law was good, it helped the people chosen by God to live right at least better off than before. However, the law became a stumbling block for them again. The law made them to become more enslaved by sin. The more they try to attain the righteousness that was by the law, the more they fall under the whip of sin. Law could not save them as they thought it would. But God knew what he was doing. God is the smartest being, he introduced the law so that his people can know what is good and pleasing in the sight of God and what is not. He introduced the law so that his people can see their shortcomings and admit their sinful nature. He introduced the law so that his people can appreciate the savior when he introduces him. God had to wait for the right time, before he introduced the savior to them. He had the plan of redemption in mind before the world began. It is part his immutable counsel that mankind who will rebel should be saved by the lamb. He didn’t just think of it when Adam fell, or when the law could not save his people from sin. He purposely allow the law to expose their sins the more, so that he could use that opportunity to introduce his plan to the world and to his people and that his plan may expressly display his dimension of love. This plan is the plan of redemption!

Jesus Christ redeemed mankind from sin, death and Satan. By the word redeemed. It shows how we became possessed by this trio after the fall. We became lost. We became slaves to sin. Then he offered himself as the lamb sacrifice to redeem us all. We then became the desired children that God wanted. The work of redemption was done from the time Jesus was arrested, flogged, spatted upon, to the cross….

And then after everything, he said…

IT IS FINISHED!

The works of redemption is finished. Humanity has been redeemed. Humanity has been saved. Humanity has been reconciled back to God. We returned to our original position with the Godhead. 

We became saved by his WORK. Not our works, not our righteousness.

Jesus did not save only the Jews who were God’s chosen people, he saved the world… not just Christians, and Muslims, Hindus Shinto, and the rest have been redeemed back to God.

We now have a problem…

This is the problem of humanity hearing, understanding and believing everything about redemption. 

Humanity is still wallowing shamefully under the chains of religion that cannot save, and have failed to believe that they have been totally saved by the works of one man, Jesus Christ. Jesus paid it all, he redeemed you and me. You have been bought back into the family of God!