When John the Baptist announced “here comes the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” he was announcing the successor to all the law and the prophets.
What a few thousand years of Israel’s efforts could not accomplish, the Lamb of God did with one single act. Christ succeeded at what that whole culture with all its wanderings, buildings, feasts and sacrifices was their utter failure to effectually deal with sin. If they had succeeded they would not have had to repeat them. But Christ said “Father if there be any other way”? With the answer no, Christ went to the cross and paid for all the sin of the world past present and future, in one fell swoop. He then offered a guilt free conscience with the right doing of faith in Him on all who would believe in Him, past present and future. As scripture says “whoever sins has neither seen Him or known Him” because they have not learned to accept the fact that the power of sin was grounded out at the cross and He became our sin to reverse that curse. Every negative feeling, act and all the consequences and ill effects of sins were defused there to clear your conscience for those who receive forgiveness.
This is why Christ at the cross is the one saving act for humanity. He bridged the gap for humanity to God the Father, hence Paul pleaded “be ye reconciled to the Father. For He made Him who knew no sin to become our sin, for us to become His righteousness to access the Father. And so He did. So we echo His words from the cross, “It is finished”. This is the gospel, meaning the good news.
As the successor who supersedes all the law and the prophet era, Christ expired and rendered them all a failure. All other acts and attempts to take away sin and bring salvation is to reject this act of Christ. Christ is now the covering for the sins of the whole world for all time without needing to do anything else for this to be true. “Without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sin”. He did this. This was displayed at the cross. The writer of Hebrews says “how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spiritoffered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?
At the cross blood dripped off His carnal fingertips, His rib cage and His forehead to the dirt below. The earth was cleansed with something heavenly but more importantly by this a conscious can be cleansed from all the I’ll effects of man’s fall where fear was born and trust in God died.
The superfluous move of the Holy Spirit is not bound by law. Laws are for the lawless. The law of the Spirit of the life that is in Christ Jesus has set me free from the law of sin and death. The internal dwelling of the Holy Spirit in a believer supersedes and expires the need for any external motivators or controllers. The law is for the lawless and the neglegent (1 Tim 1.8-10)
Those who are focused on sin, including all the confessions and anticipation of somebody coming and ridding the world of sin, has patently rejected “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world”. This is the saving sent from the Father, the only savior. That is what Savior means. He saves.
Many have heard the gospel message, but simply cannot believe that sin has met its final blow. As Christ said at the cross “Father it is finished” and so it is.
But many cannot take their eyes off of sin and condemnation to recieve a cleansed conscience and the Holy Spirit to receive eternal life, which is a conscious free from sin. (1 John 3.6)
To live with a sin based conscience is to live without knowing God who finished dealing with sin through His Son. Those who reject Him reject life and are the walking dead. They are dead to the things of God but alive to sin and the things of this age.
The sin based conscience walks by sight. Their external senses control them and what they see condemns everything. They see decay and wickedness but not God’s Glory.
Titus 1.15 To the pure all things are pure, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure; but even their mind and conscience are defiled.
