![](https://burunche.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/image-10.png?w=640)
1 John 4:9-10 “This is how God’s love was revealed among us: God sent His one and only Son into the world, so that we might live through Him. And love consists in this: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins.”
“BLOOD!!! EWWW!!! HOW GROSS CAN YOU GET???”
In an earlier age, many people raised their own animals and did their own butchering, and blood was no big deal. These days, many people hate the sight and smell of blood.
In case you haven’t’ noticed, the Bible talks a lot about blood. Read through the Book of Leviticus in the Old Testament, and you will find page after page describing blood sacrifices for various kinds of sins for various groups of people. What’s so important about blood sacrifices?
The Bible and medicine both tell us that there is life in blood. From the beginning, God commanded that anyone who sinned should confess their sin and offer a blood sacrifice as atonement for their sins. But how can the death of a lesser animal such as a sheep or a goat or a bull or a dove pay for the sins of men? Only a sinless man being willing to shed his blood could pay once and for all for the sins of other men. Hebrews 2:9 says, “But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, now crowned with glory and honor because He suffered death, so that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone.”
Being an only child is both wonderful and incredibly strenuous! My dad was an only child, and all his parents’ expectations were bound up in everything that he did. My dad was the only hope of his parents, for they had no other offspring.
Jesus is the only Son of His Heavenly Father. God the Father willingly sent Jesus to earth to live as a man and to die a shameful death by crucifixion so that anyone who would believe in what Jesus had done would be saved from their sins. It was the perfect Love of the Heavenly Father that made this opportunity for all mankind to be saved, provided they would accept what Jesus had done for them and would turn away from their sins.
When people risk their lives to save others from accident scenes, from burning buildings, or from drowning, many times those being saved don’t know those who are rescuing them. The rescuers are people of compassion who don’t want to see others suffer. God is a perfect Father and the Source of all love and compassion. If even mere humans are willing to risk their lives to save others, doesn’t it make sense that God the Father would take a risk to save as many of the human race as possible from their sins?
No. Sacrifices aren’t pretty. Crucifixion scenes aren’t pretty. But sin and the evil that motivates it are black beyond description. There are no safe places. Now even in small town America, families are being warned not to allow their children to be in stores by themselves for fear those children will be kidnapped and trafficked. The world is full of unspeakable evil.
When we confess our sins and choose to follow Jesus as Savior and Lord, God sends the Holy Spirit into our hearts. Romans 8:10 “But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit, who lives in you.”
No matter how we feel, no matter how far we try to run from God, God is still there and His Love is still available. Jesus went to the cross for each of us. Even if you had been the only person in the entire world, Jesus would still have died for your sins alone.
PRAYER: Father God, we cannot possibly understand the height and depth and breadth of your love for us! All that we can understand is that you offer us freedom and pardon from sin and eternal life, if we will only accept what Jesus has done for us. We confess that we are sinners and cannot free ourselves from anything we have done. We confess that nothing we do is good enough to earn our way into heaven. Father, forgive our sins. Help us to completely turn away from our sins and follow you. In the mighty Name of King Jesus. Amen.