Galatians 1:4
4 Who [ho] gave [didomi] himself [heautou] for [huper] our [hemon] sins, [hamartia] that [hopos] he might
deliver [exaireo] us [hemas] from [ek] this present [enistemi] evil [poneros] world, [aion] according [kata] to the
will [thelema] of God [theos] and [kai] our [hemon] Father: [pater]KJV-Interlinear
4 who gave Himself for our sins,
that He might deliver us out of this present evil age, according to the will of
our God and Father, NASB
Here we have some very technical terminology, even
though it does not seem as such on the surface.
But here we are taught that Jesus Christ gave
Himself for us, so that we might be saved.
He gave Himself, does not mean that he simply
walked up and surrendered, but here the meaning is that He rushed into the
situation. The best example of this
would be a soldier who throws himself onto a grenade in order to save everyone
else from the blast.
A grenade will detonate fairly quickly. You have to make a quick decision, an almost
instant decision, and then follow though quickly. This does not make the person a fool or
suicidal, but in fact makes him a hero in his selfless action for the safety of
others.
And Jesus, rushed into this situation. He was not a sinner, never was a sinner and
did not become a sinner. Jesus Christ
was perfect throughout the entire ordeal of the crucifixion.
Christ is God.
As God He is not capable of sinning, and capable of not sinning.
In His sacrifice, He did what the divine plan
called for, in order to save many. He
could have stepped aside and did nothing, but then none of us would be here
now.
In eternity past, the Trinity laid out a plan, for
history. In that plan it was obvious
that created beings would sin, sooner or later.
If there was an option whereby created beings would never sin as a
result of their free will options, then that plan would have been selected,
obviously.
But God created not robots, but free thinking
beings. First there were angels and next
there was humanity, and in every case, all sinned and came up way short of
perfection.
What was next needed was a plan to save as many as
possible, and that is the unfolding of history in accordance with Gods divine
plan.
The Father is credited for authoring the plan. Jesus Christ is credited with executing the
plan. And the Holy Spirit is credited with sustaining and revealing the plan.
Being in accordance with the will of the Father,
simply means that everything that Christ did, was in accordance with the divine
plan that was established in eternity past.
The purpose of the divine plan, was to save or to
deliver us from this present evil.
The present evil is the ultimate evil, which is
eternal separation from God.
God is life and truth, and to be separated from
life and truth, is to reside in oblivion which we call the Lake of Fire.
So, Christ rushed, without hesitation, into this
plan. He followed the divine plan to the
letter. He did not sin, did not fail in
any way, and while in the process of the ultimate sacrifice on the Cross, all
of the sins of humanity were poured out on Him.
This did not make Him a sinner, but made Him the recipient of our sins, for
the purpose of paying the price for sins, in order to purchase us out of the
bondage or the hold, that sin had on us.
This price paid, now means that no human being will
ever be condemned to the Lake of Fire, because of sins. But people must accept the work of Christ, or
presume that they can get into heaven by means of their own effort.
Human effort is called human works, and there were
no human works in the sacrificial process of the Cross. There was only the work of Christ. Human works is arrogance based, and Christ’s
work is divine based. So, no human
arrogance based works is included in salvation.
The Lake of Fire will be filled with those who
reject the work of Christ, in preference for their own work. Human works is simply man trying to satisfy
Gods will, by means of mans effort, ideas, human design, sincerity, and so forth.
