09 September 2006

Life In Exchange for Life

Isaiah 43: 1-13

As I have previously mentioned, Jewish Messianic tradition poses two views on the Messiah. One is that he will be human. The other holds that the Christ will be God himself. This passage from Isaiah makes it fairly clear that God will be Isaiah's only Savior.

He does, however, say that he will trade the lives of others for those of the Israelites. This can certainly be seen in history, with God favoring the Israelites over other nations. It can be seen more dramatically in the death of the prophets, who were given to Israel to show them the way, but were in turn killed. But once again, all is not as simple as it first appears. We once again arrive at a point where a prophecy has multiple fulfillments with one crowning fulfillment.

Jesus' death on the cross for our sins (and therefore, our lives) was the ultimate fulfillment of the prophecy.

Rock on.

Godly Sorrow

2 Corinthians 7:10

Regret is a bear. Every time someone stumbles, they go through a moment of reckoning in which they realize the mistake they made. And it hurts.

There are two ways to deal with this. The first is to spend a while in self pity and hate yourself, but then to get on with your life.

The second way is to repent. This means that you realize your mistake, turn it over to Christ, accept his grace, and let him help you change. Some argue that to not spend time dwelling on the fact that you sinned belittles Christ's death on the cross. CS Lewis argued that to do otherwise is the true belittlement of the Sacrifice. After all, "It is finished."

Rock on.