The -ations of the cross

From The Gospel Driven Church:

Mediation - There is a gulf between us and God, held in tension by his justified wrath owed to us for our sin. At the cross, the sinless Christ does the work of mediation both necessary and ordinarily impossible.

Condemnation - The mediator must accept the place of the guilty in order to exchange his innocence. Therefore he goes to the cross willingly, because it is the foreordained place of condemnation where we all belong. He becomes the substitute condemned and takes on the condemnation.

Propitiation - A blood debt is owed, legally speaking, because without the shedding of blood there can be no forgiveness of sins. But we cannot make this payment because we have no currency with which to do so. We are morally bankrupt, every last one of us. So at the cross, Christ makes this payment with the riches of himself, supplying his life to take the debt upon himself and thereby satisfying the law's demands. God's wrath is thereby appeased.

Imputation - By propitiating the debt of sin, he takes it off of the condemned onto himself as he becomes the condemned on the cross, but in doing that, he conveys his innocence to those actually guilty. He who knew no sin became sin that we might become the righteousness of God. His righteousness is imputed to us; this means that we are counted righteous despite our sin.

Expiation - But Jesus doesn't stop there. With his life given sacrificially on the cross, he doesn't just take on our debt, he eradicates it completely. He takes it upon himself like the scapegoat to carry our sins into the void. Another way to say this is that Jesus' work on the cross doesn't just reckon us righteous, it actually makes us righteous.

Sanctification - An ongoing work of the Spirit, to be sure, but thanks to Christ's expiating work on the cross, we are also declared sanctified on the cross, which is to say, cleansed by his blood. (1 Corinthians 6:11)

Justification - Nearly all of Christ's crosswork put together merits what we receive through faith: right standing before God. Because of the cross, we for whom there was no justification are now justified.

Reconciliation - And since we are justified before God, we are reconciled to him. The gulf is bridged, the wrath appeased, the debt canceled and cast into the void, the soul cleansed. Christ's wide-open arms at the cross reveal to us the means of the Father embracing his once-lost children. Through the cross, Christ reconciles us to God. (Colossians 1:20)

Nations - Who is Christ's crosswork for, exactly? (1 John 2:2)

Secured by Christ on the cross!

Everything that we know and appreciate and praise God for in all Christian experience both in this life and in the life to come springs from this bloody cross.

Do we have the gift of the Spirit? Secured by Christ on the cross!

Do we enjoy the fellowship of saints? Secured by Christ on the cross!

Does he give us comfort in life and death? Secured by Christ on the cross!

Does he watch over us faithfully, providentially, graciously, and covenantally? Secured by Christ on the cross!

Do we have hope of a heaven to come? Secured by Christ on the cross!

Do we anticipate resurrection bodies on the last day? Secured by Christ on the cross!

Is there a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness? Secured by Christ on the cross!

Do we now enjoy new identities, so that we are no longer to see ourselves as nothing but failures, moral pariahs, disappointments to our parents—but deeply loved, blood-bought, human beings, redeemed by Christ, declared just by God himself, owing to the fact that God himself presented his Son Jesus as the propitiation for our sins? All this is secured by Christ on the cross and granted to those who have faith in him.

- D.A Carson, Scandalous

What's so good about Good Friday?

If you've ever wondered just what is so good about Good Friday, come along to St. Mary's Cathedral (opposite Dataran Merdeka) this Friday, 7pm to find out!