Radio Talk given 15-8-99
REDEMPTION THROUGH HIS BLOOD (Eph 1:7)
The pawn brokers are doing good business nowadays. In the city of Perth there is
a pawnbroker who has his shop close to the Burswood Casino, a most strategic
location. The gambler whose luck is down, who has over extended himself, who has
gambled himself into the financial pits, finds himself going down the street to
the man who will give him a few dollars for his watch, or his son’s radio, or
that family heirloom, great grandmother’s necklace. A few dollars, so that he
can go back into the casino and gamble some more, so that when he wins he will
be able to go back to that pawnbroker and redeem that watch, that treasured
necklace, so that the wife will not notice that it had gone. What invariably
happens is, of course, that those expected winnings just do not come. The chance
to redeem those pawned goods is most remote.
I am using this example to draw your attention to the fact that you and I have
been sent to the pawnbroker, too. We ourselves were put into the storage rooms
of a pawnbroker who has no intention to let us go again, a pawnbroker who knew
full well that we had no chance whatsoever to redeem ourselves, to get ourselves
out of the predicament into which we came because of our own reckless deeds.
I am talking about our fall into sin. I am talking about our own reckless and
stupid rebellion against the very God Who had created us in His image. Life was
good, very good. We had everything our hearts desired. Yes, this was in
Paradise, in the garden of Eden, where we lived in harmony with God and nature,
a beautiful, satisfying life without problems, without needs. No strife, no
relationship breakdowns, no futile work, no poverty. Bliss, that’ s the only
word for it, pure bliss.
And we threw it away. We thought we knew better, we thought that we could climb
to even greater heights, we thought that we could become like God, Gods
ourselves. We gambled, and we lost horribly. Instead of becoming like God, we
lost our good relationship with Him, we passed from His protecting and blessing
hands into the hands of that great pawnbroker, the devil, lackeys now at the
disposal of Satan, firmly in his grip. And he loved it, never in his life would
he let us go.
Friends, when I say that WE became prisoners of the Devil, I want you to
understand that I speak of WE as human beings, we as mankind, we as inhabitants
of God’s earth. Our representatives, our fellow human beings, Adam and Eve,
fell for the temptation of the Devil. WE, and now I speak the language of the
Bible, WE were there, included in Adam and Eve. It was mankind which fell into
sin, together we became the willing victims of
Satan. His greedy and beady little eyes saw us, desired to have us, and we went
to his pawnbroker’s shop, we willingly handed ourselves over to him, we
thought we had something to gain, and we lost everything.
No pawned watch ever walked out of the pawnbrokers shop by itself. No way!
The only way pawned goods can be released is when payment is made, full payment,
to the pawnbroker. Pay the due sum, and the goods are yours again.
No sinner has walked away from the Devil by himself, in his own strength, by his
own good will or good deeds. We cannot earn back the favour of God by ourselves,
we cannot expect Him to welcome us back into His protecting and blessing arms
without payment in full. And we haven’t got the money. We haven’t got the
wherewithal. By ourselves we are never going to be able to please God to such an
extent that He is able to say: "Well done, My child, you have paid enough,
you can come back to Me now." It is impossible.
That’s if we wanted too, anyway. You know, we are so much in the power of the
will of Satan, that he has made us believe that it is not so bad with him. That
we can do without God. That we’re OK.
Do you mind if I make it a little more difficult still? Even if Satan had enough
of us and wanted to let us go, he couldn’t. The worst part of our predicament
is that God Himself placed us in the hands of the pawnbroker. In His terrible
anger against sin He Himself handed us over to the power of the Devil. And God
has decreed that HE, not Satan, but God Almighty HIMSELF has to be satisfied
with the payment for our release, for our redemption. To be redeemed from this
pawnbrokers shop, a price to God has to be paid that is totally and utterly
beyond us. We are caught. There is no way that we can get ourselves out.
Friends, I know that this teaching is not taught in many a Christian church
today. They teach that it is up to us to grab salvation, that it is up to us
whether or not we go to heaven. But that is not what the Bible teaches. God
himself says that without Him we can do nothing. Without Him we are lost
forever.
But hear now the gospel, the good tidings of great joy, the message of hope and
deliverance. GOD, Who knows better than we do that we cannot do it ourselves,
God has set about to provide the price, the full price, for us to be redeemed
from the pawnbroker’s shop of the devil, to be bought back, to be released
from our prison of sin, to be set free from the power of the Devil, the evil
one. Free, to be returned to the loving and protecting arms of God the Father
again.
How did He do it? He sent the Redeemer, the One and only One who could possibly
pay the price. The One and only One who could possibly remove the cause of our
miserable position in the showcase of the pawnbroker. Yes, He sent His only Son,
Jesus Christ, THE Redeemer. Jesus could take away our sin, could make that we
are no longer rebellious, no longer wanting to be with Satan, and makes us now
to be wholeheartedly desiring to be and to stay in the arms of God.
Isn’t that beautiful? The Apostle Paul in his letter to the Ephesians wrote in
glowing terms about the work of Jesus Christ in his life and in the lives of all
true Christians. He knew himself to have been adopted again as child of God,
that he had been rescued from the powerful grip of the Devil, he knew that Jesus
Christ had come to do what Paul could not do in a million years, that Jesus
Christ had paid the supreme sacrifice, that He died on
the cross, laid down His life in order to save Paul’s life and the lives of so
many others who would be moved by the message of this precious deed of love.
Jesus Christ is my Redeemer! Paul confessed it in no uncertain terms: In Him we
have redemption through His blood, according to the riches of His grace.
Friends, Jesus Christ is the One and only Redeemer. There is no other. It was
only when HE died on the cross that God was satisfied. Sin had been paid for, in
full, for all God’s chosen people. The road was open again for many, many
people in this world to be accepted back again as children of God. The
pawnbroker can gnash his teeth as much as he likes, but he has lost his grip. He
has to let them go.
What is the way back to God, back from being away as prisoner of sin and Satan,
back from the pawnbroker who thought he was onto a good thing? What is the way
to happiness and lasting joy? Let us stop sticking our heads in the clouds,
thinking that we can make it on our own. We can’t. Jesus Christ is the
Redeemer. Nobody comes to the Father, except through Him, by faith in Him, by
surrendering to Him, by accepting Him as Saviour and Lord. THAT changes life,
that leads us back. The way back to the Father
of mercy is through Him, the One and only Redeemer.
P. 'tHart
