Since the matter of capital punishment in the Old Testament and still being worthy of death in the New Testament appears only negative, it is important to also see positively God did not change in His love for the sinners either. In both the OT and the NT, positively, God showed the same eagerness to justify the offender.
In the time of the Levitical instructions, the sacrifices of bulls and goats acted as precursors to Christ's dying for the transgressor to justify him. When those sacrifices were done and believed in, God
"covered" the sins. In the new covenant He took away the sins.
Paul explains that when the real deal came, Christ's death was the fulfillment of all the symbolic sacrifices in the Old Testament time.
" Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus;
Whom God set forth as a propitiation place through faith in His blood, for the demonstrating of His righteousness; in that in His forbearance God passed over the sins that had previously occurred, with a view to the demonstrating of His righteousness in the present time, so that He might be righteous and the One who justifies him who is of the faith of jesus." (Rom. 3:24-26)
Now this is a very dense and difficult passage in
Romans. But
briefly I think it says something like this:
" There is the past time and there is the present time.
There is the old testament time of the law of Moses.
And there is the new covenant time when Christ came.
In the
ark of the covenant there was a lid called
the propitiation place (KJV says mercy seat). In that place the blood of animal sacrifices was sprinkled. The high priest, one a year came to meet with an otherwise unapproachable holy and righteous God.
God would meet with that representative of the congregation only because that sins of the people had been covered by the animal sacrifices, That includes the sins of those who might have been executed to death but had their sins atoned for by a sacrifice.
Christ had not come. But God overlooked those old testament sins because the believing Israelites laid hold of God's way for their justification. In forbearance and anticipation God overlooked their sins. The redeeming blood of Christ is the anti-type of those offerings.
Now Jesus Christ has come to be the reality, the fulfillment of that symbolism. Christ is a place of redemption. Christ is the real universal
propitiation place where God and man may meet and God receives man though man has sinned. "
Why do I write this? I write it to show that it was not only the worthiness of death that had not changed in God's moral judgment of the sinner. It was also no change in His way to justify, forgive, reconcile, and deal with the offending sins of that person.
Both negatively and positively God remained one one mind about the sinner.
He was worthy of death. But he also could be worthy of justification, redemption, forgiveness, having the sins dealt with that he might be reconciled to God.
From the Law to Grace
24 Nov '17 21:45
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