When we sing songs like “Nothing but the blood of Jesus” and “Forgiveness is bought with the precious blood of Jesus Christ”, do we understand what the words mean? Or when we hear that our sins can be washed away by the blood of Jesus, what does that mean?

In the first Lord’s Supper, Jesus said that His blood “is poured out as a sacrifice to forgive the sins of many” (Mt. 26:27NLT). And at the crucifixion of Jesus Christ Pilate told the crowd, “I am innocent of this man’s blood. The responsibility is yours!”. And the people replied, “We will take responsibility for His death” (Mt. 27:24-25; Acts 5:28; 20:28). So in the Bible the word “blood” is often associated with violent death. This originated from the Old Testament where in their sacrifices “blood” stood for sacrificial “death”. Animals died on behalf of the people. This is a synecdoche, which is a figure of speech where the word “blood” stands for “bloodshed” or violent death. This figure of speech is also used in the New Testament. So blood as a symbol of death appears throughout the Bible.

The main benefit of the death of Christ is that Jesus as the sinless Son of God paid the penalty for our sins in His death for us on the cross. Our sins can be forgiven and we can be reconciled with God. For example, “For you know that God paid a ransom to save you from the empty life you inherited from your ancestors. And it was not paid with mere gold or silver, which lose their value. It was the precious blood of Christ, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God” (1 Pt. 1:18-19).

Not only does the blood [death] of Christ rescue His followers from the penalty of sin, but the passages that mention His “blood” say that they receive other benefits like:
– It rescues us out of a sinful way of life and saves us from God’s condemnation (Rom. 5:9).
– It purifies our consciences from sinful deeds (Heb. 9:14).
– It makes us holy (Heb. 13:12; 1 Jn. 1:7). We are sanctified (progressively cleansed from sin).
– It unites us with Christ and brings us near to God (Eph. 2:13). We can come close to God.
– It reconciles us with God; gives peace with God; and makes us holy and blameless before God (Col. 1:20-22).
– It makes us right [justified] in God’s sight (Rom. 3:25; 5:9).
– We are part of the new covenant (1 Cor. 11:25; Heb.13:20).
– It puts us in the church where there will be people from all nations (Acts 20:28; Rev. 5:9), and
– It enables us to enter heaven and be present with God (Heb. 10:19).

There was nothing in the physical appearance of Jesus that marked Him out as special. He wasn’t special in ways that count with us. Until Christ’s baptism, John the Baptist didn’t know that Jesus was the Messiah (Jn. 1:31). But John and Jesus were cousins and knew each other growing up. So Jesus would have had a blood type that was common to humanity. There was nothing special about the blood in His body.

The hematology of the fluid in His body was not important, it was the violent death and resurrection of the innocent, sinless Son of God that matters. “The blood of Christ” means the sacrificial death of Christ.

Prayer

Father God, we thank you that the death of Jesus Christ was a vicarious sacrifice – He was a substitute for us and we received the benefits. His death was effective because it was the death of a unique sinless person.

We thank you for the many benefits that we can receive through the death of Christ including being made right in God’s sight, forgiveness, reconciliation, being made holy and blameless, and having fellowship with yourself and with others in the church and entering heaven. In Christ’s name, Amen.