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Pastor Scott L. Harris
Grace Bible Church, NY
April 20, 2025
Good Friday Sermon
The Blood Sacrifice – Selected Scriptures
Our songs and Scripture readings this evening have revolved around Jesus’ death and specifically the shedding of His blood as a sacrifice for sin. That is the subject I would like to expand upon tonight. I find that many people are quick to say they know that “Jesus died for them” or even add in the specific that “Jesus died for their sins,” but even with that, many of them do not understand the significance of Jesus’ death.
We have already read from the gospel of John the story of Jesus’ crucifixion. Before that happened, Jesus has already been betrayed by Judas with one of the most hypocritical acts of all time, for Judas used a greeting of warmth and affection, a kiss, as the sign that identified Jesus to His enemies who then arrested Him. Jesus had already suffered the two illegal Jewish trials before Annas and then Caiaphas. Jesus had endured the incompetent and cruel Roman trials. Pilate, the Roman Procurator over Judea, had already determined that Jesus was innocent at the first inquiry that morning, but instead of releasing Jesus he tried to avoid upsetting the Jews that wanted to kill Jesus by passing on the responsibility to Herod, since Jesus had come from Herod’s jurisdiction. Herod was actually glad that Jesus had been sent to him for he had been hearing about Jesus and wanted to see Jesus perform some miracle. But Jesus did not perform any miracle or even answer the illegal questioning, so Herod had his soldiers treat Jesus with contempt and mock Him before sending Him back to Pilate.
Pilate was even more convinced of Jesus’ innocence at the second trial and should have released Him, but Pilate still did not want to upset the Jews who were accusing Jesus. Pilate tried to find a way to release Jesus and appease the Jews at the same time. He tried to use the custom of releasing a prisoner at Passover to win them over by having the crowd choose who would be released that year, either Barabbas, a notorious criminal, or Jesus, but the crowd chose Barabbas to be released. Pilate tried appeasing them by having Jesus unjustly and cruelly scourged with the hope that would satisfy their hatred against Jesus, but the sight of Jesus being bloodied only enticed them more and the crowd began to shout for Jesus’ crucifixion. Pilate proved to be both unjust and a coward. He feared the crowd and the possibility of losing his position more than he feared God. He tried to remove his guilt by washing his hands in a bowl of water in front of the crowd and declaring his innocence. But water cannot remove the guilt of unjustly turning Jesus over to be crucified because a mob is demanding it.
Jesus then underwent further mocking and beatings at the hands of Pilate’s soldiers before being led away to Golgotha to be crucified. Remember that crucifixion, though it had been practiced prior to the Romans, had been perfected by them to increase its pain, torment and agony as the victim slowly died of suffocation.
Why did Jesus have to die in this manner? The common Jewish method of execution was stoning, which though it was also cruel, was at least faster than crucifixion. The victim of stoning would die in a time frame of minutes instead of the hours and even days it could take for someone to die by crucifixion. There had been attempts to kill Jesus before by throwing Him off a cliff. That would also have been faster. Or why not death by beheading as was done later to the Apostle Paul? That would have been quick and relatively painless compared to these other methods. Why did Jesus die in the manner in which He did, especially since we know from John 10:17-18 and other passages that no one could take Jesus’ life from Him, but He willingly it laid it down. If you were to choose the method by which you would die would you choose such a cruel method of such pain in which the agony would be prolonged for so long? Why then this method of death?
There are several reasons for this type of death, including that it made both Jew and Gentile guilty for it, but the two main reasons are that it had to be a blood sacrifice and it had to demonstrate that He was bearing man’s sin.
The Curse of Sin
In Galatians 3:13 we find that Paul comments on Jesus’ death and then quotes from the Old Testament. He says, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us– for it is written,” Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree.” The quote is from Deuteronomy 21:22 in which Moses is explaining the laws concerning execution of those who have committed a sin worthy of death. Moses commands, 22 “And if a man has committed a sin worthy of death, and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, 23 his corpse shall not hang all night on the tree, but you shall surely bury him on the same day (for he who is hanged is accursed of God), so that you do not defile your land which the Lord your God gives you as an inheritance.” Stoning, being cast off a cliff or beheading would not have accomplished this. Jesus’ body had to hang on a tree, the cross, in fulfilling the law and as a sign that He was bearing the curse of sin upon Himself. The worst part of the crucifixion for Jesus was not the physical pain and suffering as horrible as that was, nor was it the physical death itself. It was that moment when He bore the sins of the world and became accursed by the Father and cried out, “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” It is something we cannot comprehend, but there was an estrangement within the eternal Godhead when the Father and the Son were separated as the Son bore the curse of the law and the sins of the world.
The Deuteronomy 21 passage also tells us why the Jews wanted to have the legs broken of those who were being crucified that day – they wanted them to die quickly so that their bodies could then be taken down and buried lest they defile the land and the Sabbath that was the next day. A person with any physical stamina could often survive crucifixion for several days before their muscles became so fatigued that they could no longer lift themselves up to breathe resulting in suffocation as their own body weight constricted their lungs. Jesus had died quickly because He yielded His spirit, not because of the crucifixion itself.
The Blood Sacrifice
The second reason that Jesus had to die in the manner that He did is so that He could be a blood sacrifice. Now someone might immediately say that I had just pointed out that crucifixion kills due to suffocation and that Jesus had died because He yielded up His spirit. Neither of those involved death by loss of blood. That is true, but Jesus’ death was bloody and so it fulfilled the nature of a sin sacrifice. Remember that Jesus shed a lot of blood when He was scourged. That blood would have continued to flow while He was hanging on the cross. There was also the soldier that pierced Jesus side with his spear to confirm that Jesus was dead, and when he did, blood and water flowed out. This demonstrated that Jesus was already dead for once the heart stops, the blood stops flowing and the blood platelets separate from the serum. The result was “blood and water” flowing out from the spear thrust into Jesus’ side which would have pierced His internal organs.
Hebrews 9 & 10 explain the Old Testament sin sacrifices and Jesus’ fulfillment of them by His sacrificial and bloody death. The first thing to understand about that system is that a sacrifice died as a substitute payment for the sin penalty people had brought upon themselves by their disobedience of God. The very first such sacrifice is recorded in Genesis 3 when God killed an animal and used its skin to cover the nakedness of Adam and Eve after they had disobeyed Him and eaten from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. The animal died to make atonement for Adam and Eve. The word atonement comes from a root word which means “to cover over,” and refers to “the price of appeasement,” which for sin was the life of an animal as a substitute for the human. The clothing God made to cover the shame of Adam & Eve’s nakedness was also the constant reminder that an animal died in order to provide it.
That point must be stressed. The animal died as a substitute for Adam and Eve. God had told them that in the day that they would eat of that one forbidden tree they would surely die. They did die a spiritual death that day for their sin now put a separation between them and God. They would no longer be able to walk in fellowship with God as they had previously done in the Garden of Eden. The response of Adam and Eve to their sin was guilt and trying to hide from God. Sin not only resulted in this spiritual death, but it also made them subject to physical death as well which would have been the just punishment for their disobedience, but God substituted the life of an animal for their lives.
Animal sacrifices continue throughout the rest of Genesis – by Abel (4:4), Noah (8:20), Abraham (22) and Jacob (31:54). The various types of sacrifices became codified in the Mosaic Law in Leviticus 1-7. While there are some differences in some of the details about these sacrifices, what is common in all the animal sacrifices is that the animal died and its blood was poured out.
I mention this because there are those that have become mystical about the blood and make it into something it was not by attributing to it the power to cleanse from sin. But it was not the blood itself, but the death which the blood signified that cleansed from sin otherwise neither Jesus nor the animal sacrifices would have had to die. They would only have needed to have been cut to get some of the blood and then the wound bandaged up to heal.
In the burnt offering, peace offering, and guilt offering some of the blood of the sacrificed animal was taken and sprinkled around the altar and the rest poured out at the base of the altar. In the sin offering this was more specific in that the priest was to dip his finger in the blood and sprinkle some if it seven times before the Lord in front of the veil of the sanctuary and put some of it on the horns of the altar. The same was to be done with the blood of the sacrifices made on the Day of Atonement. Leviticus 17:11 explains, “For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you on the altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood by reason of the life that makes atonement.” This is what is being referred to throughout Hebrews in the comparison between the Old Testament sacrifices and the sacrifice of Jesus Himself.
Hebrews 9 explains that the High Priest would have to go in year after year to place the blood of an animal sacrifice on the altar and make atonement for the sins of the people. However, that altar was made with human hands and the blood was that of bulls and goats as part of the first covenant. God was gracious to receive such sacrifices, but they were only a shadow of what was to come and had to be made continually. It is in the new covenant that was ratified by Jesus’ sacrifice of Himself that by His own blood He was able to make atonement in the holy place in heaven and put away sin.
Hebrews 10 expands on that theme and demonstrates the superiority of Jesus’ sacrifice. It was impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin for they were not equivalent nor sufficient (vs. 4,11). It took the death of Jesus Christ to provide a sacrifice made once that is both equivalent and sufficient for all for the sins of man for all time. That fact is proved by Jesus sitting down and the right hand of God after atonement had been accomplished (vs. 10-14). There would be no need for another sacrifice to ever be made again. God is not blood thirsty and He did not desire the animal sacrifices nor did they please Him (vs. 5-8). What God desired was the just penalty for sin to be paid and with it the establishment of a new covenant (vs. 9-18). Man could not do this for Himself so God accomplished it through His only begotten Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus Himself became the blood sacrifice of atonement for our sins so that we may be forgiven and no longer have need for continuing sacrifices for sin (vs. 12,18).
Those are the theological truths that are behind the statement that Jesus died for our sins. He was the perfect and final substitute sacrifice that paid the just penalty of sin which is death. He made atonement for our sin by His own blood so that we may be forgiven through faith in Him. He is the blood sacrifice that established the new covenant that we may be sanctified in Him.
It is this last part, the establishing of a new covenant, that is the most neglected and misunderstood aspect of Jesus’ death for sins. The popular message in American Christianity revolves around being assured that you will be going to heaven instead of hell. There are a lot of variations on that theme, but the essence still boils down to Jesus being the fire insurance policy you need and His death was the payment of the premium. While there is some truth to that for Jesus Christ does save people from hell, it is only a partial truth that neglects the new covenant aspects of Jesus’ death and therefore misses the real purpose of salvation in Jesus Christ.
Salvation is from sin to righteousness, and salvation from hell to heaven is simply one of the benefits of that. Those who think they are saved from hell but have not entered into the new covenant and saved from sin are saved from neither. They are left in their sins and are going to hell. That is why Hebrews 10:26-31 is stated so strongly.
26 “For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, 27 but a certain terrifying expectation of judgment, and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries. 28 Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on [the testimony of] two or three witnesses. 29 How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace? 30 For we know Him who said, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay.” And again, “The Lord will judge His people.” 31 It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.”
That is a severe warning to those that want Jesus as a fire insurance policy against hell instead wanting the Lord Jesus Christ who saves us from sin. God’s vengeance will be against those who continue in willful sin after being given the truth of the gospel of Christ because that is an insult to the purpose of Jesus’ death. Jesus did not die to provide a “get out Hell free card.” He died to redeem man from sin so that man might be conformed into the image of Christ (Romans 8:29). The saved are transferred from Satan’s realm of darkness into the glorious kingdom of Christ which breaks the bondage to sin and righteousness becomes the new master (Rom. 6).
Those of us who have been saved from our sin by God’s grace through faith in the person and work of Jesus Christ have, as Hebrews 10:19 states it, “confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus.” His sacrifice has restored us to fellowship with God. Spiritual death has been reversed and we are made alive in Him (Eph. 2). We have the additional promise in Philippians 1:6 that God will continue the good work He began in us at salvation to perfect until the day Christ Jesus returns for us. That work will be accomplished in ways a lot easier on you if you will cooperate with God. If you don’t, He will still do His work in you, but it will be through the chastening He gives to a wayward child (Hebrew 12). It is easy to cooperate with God if you pursue His will over your own in response to the incredible love He has demonstrated to you in Jesus’ Christ and knowing that His ways are always better than you own.
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