Unlimited
Means for Everyone; Rev. 5:9
Whenever we are involved with an unbeliever and we give them the gospel,
explain to them the plan of salvation, at the very core behind all that we are
saying and communicating to them is an understanding that this person who has
never put their faith alone in Christ alone is someone for whom Jesus Christ
died. Jesus Christ paid the penalty for their sins; He paid the penalty for the
sins of the entire world. He had an atonement that was unlimited in its scope,
unlimited not only in terms of its extent for all human beings but also in that
He paid the penalty for sin in principle and for sins specifically. So there is
no sin that is committed in human history that was left unjudged on the cross.
Revelation 5:9 NASB “And they sang a new song, saying,
‘Worthy are You to take the book and to break its seals; for You were slain,
and purchased for God with Your blood {men} [or, redeemed us to God by your
blood] from every tribe and tongue and people and nation’.” If we do not
properly understand this key phrase “redeemed us to God by your blood” then we
do not understand what underlies what is going on here in Revelation because
the starting point, what lays the basis for the book of Revelation, for the
judgments that come in the Tribulation before Jesus Christ returns, is what
happened on the cross when He paid the sin penalty.
Reviewing from last time the idea of substitution, was this substitution
real or potential? There are three prepositions used in the Greek in this
debate. The first is huper [u(per] plus the genitive
which has the idea of “in place of.” There is the preposition anti [a)nti] meaning in place
of or substitute. Then in a couple of passage there is a third preposition, peri [peri] which also means
in place of or on behalf of. These three prepositions reinforce the fact that
Christ died as a true, genuine substitute for us. He died in our place. The Old
Testament pictures we study is that lamb that was sacrificed in the Passover. When
that lamb was sacrificed and that blood applied to the doorposts of the house
at the time of the exodus it was that substitutionary death of the lamb that
covered the house so that the angel of death passed over. That is the picture
we have for redemption.
In establishing the Lord’s table Jesus said: “This is the blood of the
new covenant which us shed for [huper,
in the place of, as a substitute] many.” Luke 22:19 NASB
“And when He had taken {some} bread {and} given thanks, He broke it and gave it
to them, saying, ‘This is My body which is given [huper] for you; do this in remembrance of Me’.” Romans 5:6 NASB
“For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for [huper] the ungodly. [7] For
one will hardly die for [huper] a
righteous man; though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die.
[8] But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet
sinners, Christ died for [huper]
us.” 1 Corinthians 15:3, 4 NASB “For I delivered to you as of first
importance what I also received, that Christ died for [huper] our sins according to the Scriptures,
and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to
the Scriptures.” 1 Peter 3:18 NASB “For Christ also died for [peri] sins once for all, {the} just for
[huper]{the} unjust, so that He
might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in
the spirit.” Why these are important is because so many people think that
Christ’s death on the cross was simply a demonstration of how much God loves
us. This is the moral use of the atonement. There are some other views of the
atonement but what Scripture teaches is a substitutionary atonement, sometimes
called a vicarious atonement, i.e. that Christ died for our sins in our place.
The atonement of Christ was unlimited. John 1:29 NASB
“The next day he saw Jesus coming to him and said, ‘Behold, the Lamb of God who
takes away the sin of the world!’” That word “world” means all of the inhabited
planet and all of those who inhabit it. This is seen in John 3:16-17 NASB
“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever
believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son
into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through
Him.” It is universal in its scope. Hebrews 2:9 NASB “But we do see
Him who was made for a little while lower than the angels, {namely,} Jesus,
because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, so that by the
grace of God He might taste death for everyone.” 2 Corinthians 5:14, 15 NASB
“For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for
all, therefore all died; and He died for all, so that they who
live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again
on their behalf.” 1 Timothy 2:3-6 NASB “This is good and acceptable
in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved
and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God, {and} one
mediator also between God and men, {the} man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself as
a ransom for [huper] all, the
testimony {given} at the proper time.”
Four key passages on the
unlimited nature of the atonement
1 Timothy 4:10 NASB
“For it is for this we labor and strive, because we have fixed our hope on the
living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of believers.” Whenever we
read that word “hope,” the Greek word elpis
[e)lpij], it has a future orientation. It is looking forward to something that
we expect, something we anticipate, and it has the idea of a confident
expectation. The “living God” here is God the Son. The Greek says exactly what
the English says here: “who is the Savior of all men [without exception],
especially of believers.” Every human being who has drawn breath throughout the
centuries has had his sins paid for. Christ is the Savior of all men but in a
unique way, a special way, in an applied way only to believers. He has paid the
sin penalty for all but only believers reap its benefit because only believers
receive the imputation of Christ’s righteousness and only believers are
regenerate. So 1 Timothy 4:10 is a key passage
for demonstrating that there are two levels of orientation through the saving
work of Christ: one for all, and another for only those who believe.
2 Peter 2:1 NASB “But false prophets also arose among the
people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly
introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought [agorazo] them, bringing swift
destruction upon themselves.” The false teachers in this chapter are not saved.
The false prophets relate to the Old Testament under Israel; the false
teachers are present in the church age. The “destructive heresies” are so
because they take the believer’s attention off the Lord Jesus Christ, they take
attention from off the sufficiency of God’s grace, of God’s Word, they put the
focus on human ability and human works and not on the sufficient and completed
work of Jesus Christ on the cross. The reason why Peter uses the word “secret”
here is because there heresies are always encased in Scripture. The words “even
denying the Mater who bought them” is the key phrase for the extent of the
atonement. A lot of people down through history have denied Jesus Christ, they
did not have a substitutionary view of the atonement.
1 John 2:2 NASB “and He Himself is the propitiation for our
sins; and not for ours only, but also for {those of} the whole world.”
Propitiation refers to the fact that He satisfied God’s righteousness and
justice. In propitiation there are a couple of key words: kapporeth is the Old Testament word that related to the mercy seat,
that area on the ark of the covenant between the two cherubs. The cherubs represented
the righteousness and justice of God, and once a year on the day of atonement
the high priest would bring the blood of the sacrifice, the lamb that was
without spot or blemish, and place it upon the mercy seat. Inside the box were
emblems of Israel’s sin. So it was a
visual image of how God’s justice and righteousness were satisfied by sin being
covered by the blood of Christ. That is the principle that is in the Greek word
hilasmos [i(lasmoj] and hilasterion [i(lasthrion] which are the
words for propitiation. The idea is that God’s righteousness and justice are
satisfied, not just for our sins but for the whole world. Christ is the one who
satisfies the Father, and so the doctrine of propitiation relates to the whole
world; the doctrine of redemption relates to the whole world.
2 Corinthians 5:18 NASB “Now all {these} things are from God,
who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of
reconciliation, namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world
to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to
us the word of reconciliation.” What we see here is that it is man who is
reconciled to God, not God to man. It is man who is the sinner, it is man who
violated the standard in the garden, so man must be reconciled to God. So
reconciles. God does the work, man simply accepts it. He performed this work of
reconciliation through Jesus Christ. Not only did he perform the work of
reconciliation through Jesus Christ but then to us who are believers in the
Lord Jesus Christ He has given the ministry of reconciliation—to every one of
us. It is every believer’s job to announce and proclaim the message of
reconciliation.
Illustrations