A two way transfer
- Jacob Ninan
Jesus died in our place, taking the punishment for our sins. Our sin was laid upon Him as He hung on the cross (Is.53:4,5). He who knew no sin was made sin for us (2Co.5:21), so that we who were sinners could be justified, accepted and set free from bondage to sin (Ro.6:17,18). He did this purely out of His love for us, and not because we deserved it.
This transfer of our sin to Jesus and our consequent freedom and blessing are the subject of many sermons, and rightly so. But great and glorious as this truth is, it is incomplete in itself. There is another truth that makes up the other side of the coin. They are inseparable, and neither of them can stand up without the other.
The 'other' truth is that when Jesus paid the price for our sins, He also bought us to be His own. He redeemed us from the ownership of Satan and transferred us from the kingdom of darkness to His light. This truth shouts out to us, "You are not your own. You have been bought with a price" (1Co.6:19,20). The price was nothing less than the blood of the Lamb (1Pe.1:18,19).
The implication is that if we don't belong to ourselves any more, and Jesus is our Owner and Master, we don't have freedom any more to do whatever we like. Satan makes it look as if it is a bondage for us to come under the ownership of Christ. But the truth is that since we were born in sin and the lusts of the flesh ruled over our flesh before we came to Jesus, what happened when we did 'our own will' was that we got more and more into bondage to sin (Ro.6:16). This was actually making us more and more miserable. Now that we have come under the lordship of Christ we have the privilege of doing His will, and that is really the best that can happen to us (Je.29:11). So contrary to the lie of the devil, becoming a slave of Christ is far better, blessed and glorious for us than to be free to do our own will!
Unfortunately, if we have fallen for the lies of the devil, even after we come to experience forgiveness of our sins as a gift of grace, we hesitate to accept our place as a bond servant of Jesus Christ. We are scared that if we gave in too much to Jesus He might take away our freedom and happiness and tie us down to a miserable life of only fasting and prayer and Bible study! Young people are scared that Jesus might tell them to get married to some creep! But these are gross lies from the devil.
If we believe these lies, and hold back from committing our lives entirely to Jesus and surrendering our ambitions and plans to Him, we miss the blessings of doing His will and receiving all the good things He has prepared for us (1Co.2:9). Then we complain why God is not fulfilling His glorious promises to us!
A mark of true faith in Jesus is that we are willing to place our entire life into His hands without reservation. He wants to do great things for us and through us. But He will not force us. He stands at the door and knocks. If any one opens the door to Him, he will be blessed beyond imagination.