Will the Circle Be Unbroken?

Posted on June 18, 2025 by russellmckinney

Will the Circle Be Unbroken? is a Christian hymn written in 1907/1908 by Ada R. Habershon and Charles H. Gabriel. The song asks the question of whether or not earthly families will be reunited in heaven. As popular as the song was, though, it was A.P. Carter’s 1935 reworking of it, entitled Can the Circle Be Unbroken (By and By)?, that made the song a national treasure. Truth be told, the Carter version has become so popular that it has rendered the original version virtually obscure.

Carter was a founding member of country music’s legendary Carter family, and his new lyrics for the song told the story of the death and funeral of the narrator’s mother. The Carter family sang their version as part of their shows for years. Then June Carter married Johnny Cash, and he took the song to an even wider audience. From there, the Carter version has been covered by some of the biggest names in music history, including Roy Acuff, Bill Monroe, Jerry Lee Lewis, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Willie Nelson, the Neville Brothers, and the Allman Brothers band.

In answer to the song’s question, let me say that as important as your earthly family is, it pales in significance to your membership (or lack of it) in God’s eternal family. Despite what a million movies, television shows, books, and songs tell us — to say nothing of the entire Mormon religion with its false doctrine of “celestial marriage” — earthly relationships do not extend into the afterlife. I will know my wife Tonya in heaven, but she won’t be my wife. I will know my sons, but they won’t be my sons. I will know my mom and dad, but they won’t be my parents. I will know my brother, but he won’t be my brother. These relationships won’t be inferior to what they are now; they’ll just be different. Not worse. Better. Everything in heaven is better.

What’s key, though, is that all these people I have mentioned will be there. And why will we all be there? Will it be because everybody ends up in heaven? No. Will it be because we were such a tight-knit group on earth? No. Will it be because our love spans the test of time across the ages? No. We will all be there because each of us, as an individual, has placed saving belief in Jesus Christ and thereby become a Christian. That’s how one becomes a part of the eternal family of God. Consider the following passages (all from the N.K.J.V.):

  • And He stretched out His hand toward His disciples and said, “Here are My mothers and My brothers! For whoever does the will of My Father in heaven (He explains in John 6:40 that this will equates to receiving eternal life by believing in Him) is My brother and sister and mother.” (Matthew 12:48-50, explanation mine)
  • But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. (John 1:12-13)
  • Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” (John 14:6)
  • For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:26)
  • Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone… (Ephesians 2:19-20)

These passages all teach the same thing, which is that placing life-changing, eternity-altering, soul-saving belief in Jesus Christ is how you become a part of the family of God. And did you know there are no less than three ways by which the Bible analogizes the Christian becoming a part of that family? Let’s look at each of the three.

First, to place saving belief in Jesus is to become a “born again” “babe in Christ.” This means that the Christian is (in a very real sense) born into the family of God. As we read in John 3:3:

Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” (N.K.J.V.)

Other passages that speak of the new Christian becoming a “born again” “babe in Christ” are:  John 3:5-8; 1 Peter 1:3-4; 1 Peter 1:22-25; 1 Corinthians 3:1-2; Hebrews 5:12-14; and 1 Peter 2:1-3.

Second, to place saving belief in Jesus is to become an adoptee. This means that the Christian is (in a very real sense) adopted into the family of God. As the apostle Paul says in Galatians 4:4-7 to the Christians of Galatia:

But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, “Abba, Father!” Therefore you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ. (N.K.J.V.)

Other passages that speak of the Christian as being adopted are: Romans 8:14-17; Romans 8:22-24; and Ephesians 1:3-6.

Finally, third, to place saving belief in Jesus is to become a bride. This occurs because the new Christian automatically becomes a part of Christ’s bride, the church. This means that (in a very real sense) the Christian marries into the family of God. As Paul says in 2 Corinthians 11:2 to the Christians of Corinth:

For I am jealous for you with godly jealousy. For I have betrothed you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. (N.K.J.V.)

Other passages that speak of the Christian as becoming a part of the bride of Christ are: Matthew 9:14-15; Mark 2:18-20 John 3:27-30;  Ephesians 5:22-33; and Revelation 19:5-9.

You see, the Christian just can’t be more a part of the eternal family of God. He or she is born into it, adopted into it, and married into it. Because of this the Christian will enjoy a dual existence in eternity as not only a child of God but also a part of Christ’s bride. All earthly relationships will be rendered obsolete as God the Father fills the role of the Christian’s father and God the Son fills the role of the Christian’s spouse. So, to answer the old song’s question, the family circle will indeed remain unbroken for Christians in heaven, but it will be a much different (and better) family circle than anything we experience on this earth.

Posted in Belief, Children, Death, Entertainment, Eternal Security, Eternity, Faith, Family, Fatherhood, Heaven, Husbands, Marriage, Motherhood, Music, Parenting, Personal, Salvation, Wives | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A Lack of Loyalty

Posted on June 16, 2025 by russellmckinney

A Baptist was marooned, alone, on an uncharted island. He lived there for several years before a passing ship happened to see his fire one night and changed course to investigate. When some of the crew made their way by boat to the island, they found the man and three huts that he had built. They asked him, “What are these three huts?” He answered, “One is where I live, and one is where I go to church.” When they asked him about the third hut, he said, “Oh, that one, that’s where I used to go to church.”

Unfortunately, this story hits a little too close to home for comfort. Church splits are far too common in the Christian realm, and members who leave one church and join another one right down the road are even more common. Actually, a large percentage of “church growth” these days isn’t so much from evangelism as it is from “church swapping.” Some of this has to do with the fact that loyalty has become a scarce commodity in our world.

College basketball is now providing us with a prime example of this lack of loyalty. Because the current rules for professional (NBA) basketball require a player to attend at least one year of college before he can be drafted by an NBA team, the college ranks have become dominated by “one and done” star players. A “one and done” player is a kid who would rather jump straight to the pros right out of high school, but by rule he has to put in a year of college before an NBA team can draft him.

The end result is that the kid commits to some college team for a freshman season, does enough schoolwork to keep him eligible to play, and then immediately declares for the NBA draft as soon as the season concludes. After all, why should he bother to get a degree so that he can earn a good salary when an NBA team stands ready to give him millions of dollars just to play basketball? Even graduates don’t land jobs that pay that much.

What’s interesting, though, is what the “one and done” trend has done to college coaches. Basically, it’s turned them into hypocrites. You see, these are the same guys who love to give rousing, passionate speeches about showing loyalty to them, working hard to earn playing time, and letting them mold you into not only a quality player but also a quality person. Then these same coaches bench seniors and juniors (who’ve done everything the coaches have ever asked of them) and make starters of freshmen who won’t even be part of the team next season. In other words, the coaches demand loyalty and show none.

But it’s not just church circles or athletic ranks that are vacant of loyalty these days. In regards to satellite companies, cable companies, internet companies, and cell phone companies, who do these companies offer their best deals on programming packages? Do they offer them to the customers who have been with them for years? Nope. It’s the new customers who just signed up who get the great introductory deals. As for rewarding longtime customers who’ve faithfully paid their bills for years, that concept doesn’t seem to register with these companies.

I’m so glad that God still knows what loyalty means and that He remains faithful to His people even when we don’t remain faithful to Him. That’s why I’d like to close this post by citing 1 Corinthians 1:9. Christian, after you’ve read the verse, take a moment to thank God for being such a God. After all, if He was like a lot of church goers, coaches, or companies, He’d have left us by the side of the road a long time ago and embraced someone new.

God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. (1 Corinthians 1:9, N.K.J.V.)

Posted in Change, Choices, Church, Church Attendance, Commitment, Current Events, Decisions, Faithfulness, Perseverance, Sports | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The 10 Times Israel Tested God

Posted on June 13, 2025 by russellmckinney

Most people have heard about the ten plagues with which God struck Egypt to break Pharaoh’s will and cause him to release the Israelites from their enslavement (Exodus chapters 7 through 12). Far less known are the ten times the released Israelites put God to the test in the days following their exodus. But God certainly knew about them. As Numbers 14:20-23 says:

Then the Lord said: “I have pardoned, according to your word, but truly, as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord — because all these men who have seen My glory and the signs which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and have put Me to the test now these ten times, and have not heeded My voice, they certainly shall not see the land of which I swore to their fathers, nor shall any of those who rejected Me see it.” (N.K.J.V.)

Okay, so when were those ten times the Israelites tested God? The list goes as follows:

  1. When the Israelites are trapped between Pharaoh’s army behind them and the Red Sea in front of them, they cry out to the Lord and complain to Moses, saying, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you have led us out into this wilderness to die? Didn’t we tell you when we were in Egypt to leave us alone so that we could continue serving the Egyptians? It would have been better for us to have died back there than to die here.” (Exodus 14:10-12)
  2. After the Israelites have been in the Wilderness of Shur for three days without finding water, they come to Marah. There is water in Marah, but it is so bitter no one can drink it. So, the people complain against Moses again. (Exodus 15:22-24)
  3. On day 15 of the second month after their departure from Egypt, the Israelites grow hungry and complain against Moses and Aaron, saying, “Oh, that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by pots of meat and ate bread to the full. Now you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill us all with hunger.” (Exodus 16:1-3)
  4. When God starts sending the Israelites manna to eat every morning, Moses warns them against trying to save some of their daily portion and eat it the following day. Despite the warning, however, some of them try it and learn that the manna breeds worms and starts stinking if left overnight. (Exodus 16:11-20)
  5. Also concerning the gathering of the manna, Moses tells them they should gather twice as much as usual the morning before each Sabbath morning because God won’t send the manna on the Sabbath. Still, despite the fact that the Sabbath is to be a day of rest, some of the Israelites go out to gather manna on the first Sabbath morning following that command. Of course, they find none. (Exodus 16:25-30)
  6. When the Israelites come to Rephidim, they complain because there is no water to drink. They ask Moses, “Why have you brought us out of Egypt? Was it to kill us, our children, and our livestock with thirst?” Their complaints are serious enough for Moses to think they are going to stone him. (Exodus 17:1-4)
  7. When the Israelites are encamped at the base of Mount Sinai, Moses goes up into the mountain to be alone with God and receive revelation. Moses is gone so long, 40 days, that the people figure he is never going to return. So they, with the help of Aaron, create a golden calf to serve as their new god. They worship it and offer sacrifices unto it. (Exodus 32:1-6)
  8. Three days after their departure from Mount Sinai, the Israelites complain again. The Bible doesn’t tell us precisely what they complain about on this occasion, but the complaints are infuriating enough to God to cause Him to burn some of the people to death with fire. (Numbers 11:1-3)
  9. Shortly after the deaths by fire, the Israelites complain again about the food situation. This time they are tired of eating the manna and long for the fish, cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic of Egypt. (Numbers 11:4-34)
  10. When Israel’s 12 spies return from studying the land of Canaan, they tell the people that Canaan is a land of giants that devours those who try to inhabit it. This causes the people to complain against Moses and Aaron, saying, “If only we had died in Egypt or in the wilderness. Why has the Lord brought us to this land to fall by the sword and watch our wives and children become victims? Wouldn’t it be better if we all just returned to Egypt?” Then the people start making plans to select a new leader, one who will lead them back to Egypt. (Numbers 14:1-4)

As we read the full accounts of these ten times Israel tested God, we see God’s increasing frustration and decreasing patience with them. Notice the trend:

  1. Test #1? He parts the Red Sea.
  2. Test #2? He shows Moses a tree that, when cut and cast into Marah’s bitter waters, makes the waters sweet.
  3. Test #3? He begins sending them manna each morning except the weekly Sabbath morning.
  4. Test #4? Despite their blatant attempts to break the rules concerning the manna, He keeps sending it.
  5. Test #5? See the response to test #4.
  6. Test #6? He has Moses strike a certain rock with his staff, after which water comes gushing out of the rock.
  7. Test #7? He tells Moses what is going on in the Israelite camp and agrees to show the nation mercy they surely didn’t deserve.
  8. Test #8? With His patience now wearing thin, He kills only a few of the people as a warning rather than killing all of them.
  9. Test #9? He has a tremendous flock of quail blow into Israel’s camp to be killed and eaten for food, but even as the people are eating the meat, He puts a number of them to death by way of plague.
  10. Test #10? He tells Moses the Israelites will wander in the wilderness for 40 years, during which time every Israelite 20 years old or older (except for Joshua and Caleb) will die off systematically so that Israel’s younger generation can eventually conquer and settle Canaan.

The application for us from all this isn’t hard to grasp. How often do we test God by griping and grumbling about our circumstances? Speaking for myself, I do it far too much.

I’ll admit that I’ve seen a few figurative waters parted and a few bitter ones made sweet. I’ve tasted some personalized manna and had some other needs met as well. I’ve been shown mercy that I didn’t deserve and received my share of instructive warnings. I’ve eaten some figurative quail that tasted good for a moment but came with severe consequences. I’ve also missed out on some wonderful opportunities because of my sin.

So, really, I’m not that much better than the Israelites in regards to grumbling, murmuring, and testing God. That’s why I need reminders like this post. And my guess is that I’m not on an island of one. As Philippians 2:14 tells us, “Do all things without complaining and disputing…” I ask you, Christian, how are you doing on that these days?

Posted in Adversity, Attitude, Complaining, Contentment, Desires, Faith, God's Provision, The Tongue, Trials, Trusting In God | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Dying in Your Sins

Posted on June 11, 2025 by russellmckinney

If the thought of dying in your sins sounds terrifying to you, it should. What follows such a death is the lifting up of the eyes in hell (Luke 16:23) as the body goes to the grave and the soul goes into the afterlife. You see, that’s what happens to each individual who lives his or her entire life and never places saving belief in Jesus. A certain group of Pharisees heard that message one day, with the message bearer being none other than Jesus. We read about it in John 8:21-24:

Then Jesus said to them again, “I am going away, and you will seek Me, and will die in your sin. Where I go you cannot come.” So the Jews said, “Will He kill Himself, because He says, ‘Where I go you cannot come’?” And He said to them, “You are from beneath; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for if you do not believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.” (N.K.J.V.)

As I normally do on the blog, I’ve used the New King James Version to cite the above reference. Like the classic K.J.V., the N.K.J.V. uses italicized words to show where the word in question doesn’t actually translate a word found in the original Hebrew or Greek. Instead, the italicized word is added in by the translator in an attempt to not only complete the sentence structure of the English language but also make the translation easier to read. When I use N.K.J.V. references on the blog, I never repeat the italics in my citations because I don’t want the reader to think that I myself have italicized the word for emphasis. However, in the case of John 8:24 I need to draw your attention to something.

The N.K.J.V. italicizes the word “He” in Christ’s quote: “…for if you do not believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.” So, if we omit the “He” — again, it doesn’t translate anything from the original Greek — we find that what Jesus literally said was, “…for if you do not believe that I AM, you will die in your sins.” This name/title “I AM” was very familiar to those Jewish Pharisees because they knew their Old Testament. Standing at the burning bush, Moses had asked God to reveal His name so that Moses could speak to the Israelites in the authority of that name. And God had answered him, “Tell them, ‘I AM has sent me to you’” (Exodus 3:13-14).

Obviously, Jesus claiming that particular name/title for Himself was a powerful statement about His divinity. It was His way of telling those Pharisees, “When you see Me, you see the God of your ancestors. That God was, of course, the true and living God, the God who spoke to Moses, the God who led the Israelites out of Egypt, the God who gave the Israelites His law, the God who gave the Israelites the land of Canaan, and the God of salvation.

Later on in that same teaching session, Jesus once again made this astounding claim by saying to those Pharisees, “Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM” (John 8:58, N.K.J.V.). By that time, though, they’d heard all they were going to hear of that, and they picked up stones to stone Him to death for blasphemy in accordance with Leviticus 24:16. But Jesus, knowing that it wasn’t the time, the place, or the cause for Him to die, escaped from them (John 8:59).

By attempting to stone Jesus, those Pharisees made it clear that they had made their decision concerning Him. Actually, they had rejected Him long before the attempted stoning. Even as Jesus spoke with them that day, He knew their hearts were already eternally set against Him. That’s how He could already predict their future when He said to them concerning His death, resurrection, and ascension:

Then Jesus said to them again, ‘I am going away, and you will seek Me, and will die in your sin…” (verse 21, N.K.J.V., emphasis mine)

I don’t know where this post finds you in life, but you need to understand one simple truth: Failure to place saving belief in Jesus Christ will seal your eternal fate. God is sinless, but you are a sinner. Therefore, what does a sinner need most of all? Forgiveness. God has provided that forgiveness via the blood that Jesus shed in dying on the cross as the substitutionary sacrifice for the sins of the human race, but to receive the forgiveness you must believe in Jesus as your personal Savior. To reject Him is to reject the forgiveness, and the end result of that will be you dying in your sins and lifting up your eyes in hell. Those Pharisees made their choice, and they chose poorly. How about you?

Posted in Belief, Choices, Christ's Death, Christ's Resurrection, Death, Eternity, Forgiveness, God's Provision, Heaven, Hell, Needs, Salvation, Sin, The Gospel | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A Strange Prayer Request

Posted on June 9, 2025 by russellmckinney

A man and his wife joined a local church. Since the couple was out of work and had precious little food and clothing, it wasn’t long before they asked the church for help. The church lovingly obliged by providing plenty of donations, and the pastor even helped the husband find a good job.

During their time of need, the couple attended church faithfully. But once they were back on their feet, that attendance stopped. Even though this irked the pastor, he let the situation slide because there wasn’t a lot he could do about it anyway. After all, a preacher can’t force people to come to church.

Then came a night when the pastor was walking along a downtown street and just happened to run into the couple. The couple were well dressed and obviously very much into themselves. As a matter of fact, they would have passed right by the pastor without speaking if he hadn’t spoken first.

The pastor said, “My, you folks certainly do look good. Where are you headed?” The wife answered, “We’ve just had a wonderful meal at a nice restaurant, and we’re going home now. ” The pastor said, “Well, I guess you know that we’ve been missing you at church lately.” Now it was the husband’s turn to answer. He said, “Oh, you know how it is. We both work hard every day, and Sunday’s the only day we have to do the things we like to do.”

Both the husband and the wife hoped that excuse would suffice and the conversation would come to a polite end, but the pastor was having none of it. Perhaps his tone wasn’t the best in the world, and his social etiquette surely wasn’t, but he did feel led of the Lord to say what he said. He looked the husband squarely in the eyes and said, “Do you know what we ought to do? We ought to get down on our knees and ask God to take away your job so that you can have time to worship and serve Him because He has been so good to you.” Ouch. Point made.

This story really happened. I cut it out of a Christian publication years ago and stuck it in my files. Really, though, even if it wasn’t true, it could be. We are so prone to run to the Lord when times are bad and so prone to drift away from Him when times are good, aren’t we?

Needless to say — then again, maybe it does need to be said — the exact opposite should be the case. Romans 2:4 is a good proof passage here, and so I’ll use it to close this post. As you read the verse, pay close attention to what it says about what God’s goodness toward you should produce in your life. I don’t think you’ll have any trouble spotting the lesson. The verse says:

Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance? (N.K.J.V.)

Posted in Adversity, Backsliding, Church, Church Attendance, Commitment, Faithfulness, God's Love, God's Provision, Husbands, Money, Pastors, Prayer Requests, Priorities, Prosperity, Repentance, Service, Stewardship, Thankfulness, Wives, Worship | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Born Again

Posted on June 6, 2025 by russellmckinney

“Salvation” series (post #9)

Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” (John 3:3, N.K.J.V.)

The Bible teaches that each individual consists of a body, a soul, and a spirit (1 Thessalonians 5:23). In this way, we are somewhat like God in that we are triune beings. The difference is that our body, soul, and spirit aren’t each distinct persons, as is the case with the three members of the holy Trinity.

Now, Jesus said that an individual cannot see the kingdom of God unless that individual is born again. But what exactly does that mean? To answer that, let’s refer back to those three different parts of a person.

First, does the person’s body need to be born again? No. That’s the question Nicodemus asked when he replied, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”

Second, does the person’s soul need to be born again? No. The soul cannot either die or be “born” again. The soul is that part of you that goes into the afterlife when your body dies (Genesis 35:18). We might say that your soul is the real you. This explains why verses such as Psalm 6:3 and Ezekiel 18:20 use the word “soul” to speak of the entire person. Think of this way: You are a soul who is right now living inside a body.

Third, does the person’s spirit need to be born again? Evidently, this is the case. A parallel passage on this subject is Ephesians 2:1, which speaks of people as being “dead in trespasses and sins.” If neither the person’s body or soul is dead, that only leaves the spirit. So, while in one sense the spirit is that part of the individual that animates the human body (James 2:26; Ecclesiastes 12:7), in another sense it is that part that houses the capacity for the kind of worship and communion with God that Adam and Eve enjoyed before the fall.

This is what Jesus meant when He told the Samaritan woman at the well, “But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:23-24, N.K.J.V., emphasis mine). You see, Jesus didn’t say that we must worship God “in body” or “in soul.” It’s the spirit that earns that unique distinction.

Putting everything together, what scripture seems to teach is that each of us is born with an inner spirit that isn’t functioning as it was originally designed to function. It’s doing fine at bringing life to our otherwise lifeless body and thus creating physical life, but it’s downright shut down when it comes to creating spiritual life. Therefore, each of us is born “dead in trespasses and sins” and needs what we might call a resurrection in our spirit. That’s why Jesus said, “You must be born again” (John 3:7).

But just exactly how do we go about being born again? What does it take to be spiritually reborn? Is there a course we must purchase? Is there a five-step process? The answer is: The moment you place saving belief in Jesus, you are instantly born again. Believing in Jesus is your part and bringing you to life spiritually is God’s part.

Let me explain how this works. In John 3:5-8, Jesus describes being born again as being born “of the Spirit” (capital S, referring to God the Holy Spirit). Specifically, He says, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” You see, the moment you place saving belief in Jesus, God the Holy Spirit comes to take up literal residence inside your body (Romans 8:9-11; 1 Corinthians 6:19), and He is the one who fixes your defective spirit and allows it to function as it should. This is all part of the “new birth” experience the Holy Spirit creates inside you.

The apostle Paul described the Holy Spirit’s entrance as “the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5), and the apostle John described it as being “born of God” (1 John 5:1). What else could John have been referring to except being “born again”? So, to be born again is to be born of God the Holy Spirit.

John also associated the new birth with having “eternal life” (1 John 5:10-13). Most people hear that term “eternal life” and wrongly put the emphasis on the word “eternal,” as if having eternal life simply means existing forever somewhere in the afterlife. But the reality is that everyone will spend eternity somewhere in the afterlife, either with God in perfect bliss or separated from Him in torment. That’s why the emphasis in “eternal life” should be placed on the word “life.” The idea is that the indwelling Holy Spirit has entered into the body of a person who was spiritually dead in trespasses and sins and brought that individual back to spiritual life.

The Bible’s most well-known way of describing the Holy Spirit’s entrance into the believer’s body is to refer to the experience as “the baptism of the Holy Spirit” (John 1:33; 1 Corinthians 12:13). The first people to ever enjoy the blessing of this “baptism” were a group of Christ’s followers who were meeting for worship services in an upper room in Jerusalem in the days following Jesus’ resurrection and ascension to heaven. Just before Jesus ascended, He promised them they would be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from then (Acts 1:4-5). The fulfillment of that promise is recorded in Acts 2:1-41.

Someone asks, “So, is Acts 2:1-41 indicative of every instance of someone experiencing the baptism of the Holy Spirit (getting born again)?” No, it isn’t. As evidence that they had been baptized with the Holy Spirit, those believers all began to speak in “tongues” (foreign languages they had never learned). That in turn created quite a stir in Jerusalem, so much so that Peter ended up preaching a powerful sermon there on the spot, a sermon after which approximately 3,000 people believed in Jesus and agreed to water baptism (Acts 2:14-41). No mention is made, however, of those 3,000 new believers speaking in foreign languages. The same holds true for the additional 2,000 new believers who placed saving belief in Jesus shortly afterward (Acts 4:4), the scores of others who did so even later (5:14; 6:1), the Ethiopian eunuch (8:26-39), Saul of Tarsus (9:1-19), Lydia and her household (Acts 16:11-15), the Philippian jailer and his household (16:25-34), the believers in Thessalonica (17:1-4), the believers in Berea (17:10-15), etc., etc., etc.

The fact is, the book of Acts is a transitional book that serves as the record of the early years of what we call “the church age.” Those years were filled with all kinds of uncommon stories and miraculous happenings, none of which have ever been commonplace and certainly aren’t today. For this reason, we must always be hesitant about building core doctrine around the stories from Acts. Romans is considered the New Testament’s greatest doctrinal book, and it devotes pretty much an entire chapter — chapter 8 — to the subject of Holy Spirit baptism. Significantly, though, the chapter never once mentions speaking in tongues as the evidence of the experience.

Someone else might ask, “But what about the saved believers from the Old Testament? Didn’t the Holy Spirit indwell them? Were they not born again?” The truth is that Holy Spirit baptism (the new birth) was not part of God’s work in the lives of those believers. Just as those believers lived in a pre-Jesus era, they also lived in a pre-Holy Spirit baptism era.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that those believers didn’t worship God and commune with Him in their own capacity. No one is saying that believers such as Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Samuel, David, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel couldn’t worship God, commune with Him, fellowship with Him, and be in right relationship with Him. However, the idea of having Him literally dwell inside their bodies was something completely unknown to them. In God’s plan, such a thing just didn’t happen in those days. This leads us to conclude that the worship and communion those believers enjoyed with God, as legitimate as it all was, was curtailed to a fair degree by the fact that the spirit part of their bodies remained defective. Unfortunately for those believers, that was one of the many spiritual disadvantages — along with not having a completed Bible, not having any churches, and not being able to look back upon Jesus’ death as an historical event — with which they had to live.

But now as I wrap up this post and this “Salvation” series, let me just ask you: Have you placed saving belief in Jesus and thereby been born again by the baptism of the indwelling Holy Spirit? Has the Holy Spirit taken up residence inside you and fixed your defective spirit? Since God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are one, has the indwelling Spirit changed your way of thinking, talking, dressing, conducting yourself, etc. and made them more pleasing to God? As 1 Corinthians 6:19 describes, has the Spirit transformed your body into His temple?

Friend, these are not unimportant questions. The “born again” experience is certainly nothing to take lightly, and if you doubt that you have experienced it, then you have every right to doubt that you have placed saving belief in Jesus and are on your way to heaven. Please understand that I’m not trying to cause you to doubt your salvation. But if I can cause you to doubt it by merely asking a few basic questions that come out of scripture, then you need to check up on whether or not you are authentically saved. That is the point I’m trying to get across to you, and it’s a point that I’ll leave between you and God. Always keep in mind, though, those emphatic words from Jesus: “You must be born again.” The man to whom He first spoke those words was Nicodemus, and all indications are that Nicodemus was part of that original group who experienced Holy Spirit baptism in Jerusalem. That means that Nicodemus took Jesus’ words seriously and brought his life in line with them. So, the question is now: Will you do the same?

Posted in Baptism, Belief, Christ's Resurrection, Church, Eternity, Faith, Grace, Heaven, Hell, Human Life, Salvation, Series: "Salvation", The Holy Spirit, The Trinity, Worship | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Saving Belief

Posted on June 4, 2025 by russellmckinney

“Salvation” series: (post #8)

Jesus died on a Roman cross to pay the penalty for the sin debt every individual owes to holy God. On the third day afterward, He arose from the dead. He then spent the next 40 days making various appearances in His resurrected, glorified body to His disciples and others (Acts 1:1-3). At the end of those 40 days, He ascended up to heaven (Acts 1:4-11) to retake His place at the right hand of God the Father (Acts 7:56; Romans 8:34; Ephesians 1:20; Colossians 3:1). From there, He now offers salvation to one and all.

We must not make the mistake, however, of assuming that Christ’s death on the cross means that every individual’s sin debt is paid. As I noted in the previous post, Christ’s death was sufficient to pay for everyone’s sins but it isn’t efficient to pay for them. A simple illustration here might help.

Let’s say that a man walks into a crowded restaurant, hands the cashier $10,000 in cash, and announces to all the patrons, “I’m paying for everybody’s meal. When you get your bill, just bring it to the cashier, sign your name on a piece of paper, and your debt will be paid.” Okay, so what must happen for a customer to have his or her bill paid? That customer must follow the instructions and in so doing accept the payment, right? But what if a customer insists on paying his or her own bill? Obviously, the man’s payment won’t help them. This illustration isn’t perfect, but it at least showcases the reason why Christ’s death on the cross stands as the payment for the sins of some people but not the sins of others. Some people just don’t accept the payment.

Of course, this begs the question, “And how does a person accept the payment?” The Bible’s answer is: You must believe in Jesus as your personal Savior. There’s a reason that John 3:16 is the most famous verse in the Bible. It says:

“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish, but have eternal life.” (N.A.S.B.)

However, before we blow right past this matter of belief, let’s be sure that we understand it properly. The problem is that there are different types of belief and they don’t all equate to salvation. For example, James 2:19 tells us that even the demons (fallen angels) believe there is one God. But the demons aren’t saved.

Likewise, even though John 2:23 says that many “believed” (N.K.J.V.) in Jesus’ name when they saw the miracles He did, the next verse says He did not “commit Himself” (N.K.J.V.) to those people. Actually, the same Greek word is used in both verses for “believed” and “commit Himself.” It’s the Greek word pisteuo. For that matter, pisteuo is also the word used in John 3:16. So, the teaching of John 2:23 is that even though some people believed in Jesus, He didn’t believe in them. Evidently, their belief wasn’t the right kind for them to experience salvation.

Another relevant passage on this is Matthew 7:21-23. Jesus can’t be much clearer there when He says that many so-called “believers” who evoke His name and supposedly have impressive religious works on their resumes are, in reality, still unsaved. He says in those verses:

“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’” (N.K.J.V.)

It is because of passages such as John 2:23-24 and Matthew 7:21-23 that the term “saving belief” has been coined. This term isn’t scriptural, but I have no qualms about using it and do so often in my preaching. The term is merely an attempt to draw a line of distinction between the kind of belief that leads to salvation and the kind that doesn’t.

It has often been noted that saving belief is much more than just intellectual assent to the facts about Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection as they are presented in the Bible. It’s more than just celebrating His birth at Christmas and His resurrection at Easter. It’s more than just calling yourself a “Christian” simply because you were born into a “Christian” family or a “Christian” nation. No, true saving belief in Jesus runs much deeper than any of that.

Allow me to list the New Testament’s various ways of explaining what saving belief entails. As you read these, keep in mind that they aren’t separate decisions or various “stages” of belief. Each one is, instead, a way of describing what saving belief in Jesus is. In other words, when a person places saving belief in Jesus, that person will automatically be doing all of these things simultaneously. Salvation is a moment-in-time experience, not a process. Here’s the list:

  • To place saving belief in Jesus is to come to Him: Matthew 11:28-30; John 5:39-40; John 6:35-37
  • To place saving belief in Jesus is to follow Him: Matthew 4:18-20; Mark 2:14
  • To place saving belief in Jesus is to call upon Him: Romans 10:9-13
  • To place saving belief in Jesus is to put your faith in Him: Romans 3:21-23; Colossians 3:15
  • To place saving belief in Jesus is to receive Him: John 1:12; Colossians 2:6
  • To place saving belief in Jesus is to open the door to Him: Revelation 3:20
  • To place saving belief in Jesus is to trust in Him: Ephesians 1:11-14; 1 Timothy 4:10

Mark 1:15 and Acts 20:21 also bring repentance into the mix. To repent is to turn from your sins and go in the opposite direction. Because of this some have erroneously concluded that a person’s salvation can’t be genuine unless the person first turns from sin. For example, these people say that an alcoholic must quit drinking before he or she can genuinely believe in Jesus and be saved. Such a teaching misses the point that saving belief, by necessity, includes a certain amount of repentance.

Here again, an illustration might be helpful. In your mind, picture yourself walking down a road. Now think of Jesus coming toward you, walking down the same road but in the opposite direction. As the two of you pass, He says to you, “Follow Me.” In order for you to follow Him, what are you going to have to do? You’re going to have to turn and start walking in the opposite direction. In this way, your decision to follow Jesus, by necessity, included repentance on your part. Do you understand?

Now let me clarify something else: The saved people from the pre-Jesus era were saved in the same way as those from the post-Jesus era. There never has been and never will be two different plans of salvation. Salvation has always required saving belief. In a previous post, I explained how the blood sacrifices offered in the Old Testament era all pointed to Jesus’ sacrificial death on the cross. In God’s eyes, the blood from those sacrifices covered the sins until Christ’s blood could be shed in time and history to eternally cleanse the sins. In that way, Christ’s death and all those Old Testament sacrifices were part of the same grand plan. Well, the same type of thing is true of saving belief.

Romans 4:1-8 explains that both Abraham and David, two of God’s choicest servants from the Old Testament, were saved by belief. The only difference between them and saved people from this present day is the fact that they didn’t have as much revelation concerning God as we do now. What I mean is, God hadn’t formally revealed Himself as a Trinity yet.

Nevertheless, the Old Testament believers’ lack of knowledge about God being a Trinity didn’t render their belief in Him illegitimate. Make no mistake, when the likes of Abraham and David placed their belief in God, they were placing saving belief in the same God as we do today when we place saving belief in Jesus (God the Son). What makes this possible is the fact that God is ONE God.

When Jesus told His followers to make disciples of all nations and baptize them, He didn’t say, “Baptize them in the names (plural) of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19). To the contrary, He said, “Baptize them in the name (singular) of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. In another place, He even said, “I and My Father are one” (John 10:30). And then there is 1 John 5:7, which refers to Jesus as “the Word” in saying:

For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one. (N.K.J.V.)

You see, when you understand that God is one God who has eternally existed in three distinct persons, you can understand that when Abraham, David, and all the other saved believers from the Old Testament era placed their belief in God, they were, in a very real sense, placing their belief in Jesus. Don’t penalize those believers over the fact that God, in His plan, didn’t fully reveal Himself as a Trinity to them. He certainly doesn’t penalize them for it.

Someone asks, “But what about good works? Don’t they have something to do with salvation?” No, they don’t. For one thing, even our so-called “good” works carry the taint of sin (Isaiah 64:6). For another, in order for you to be saved by works, you would have to never commit even one sin (James 2:10; Galatians 3:10). Even more than that, your sinless perfection would have to include not just your outward actions but also your inward thoughts, motives, and desires (Matthew 5:21-48; Mark 7:20-23). Good luck with that.

And so, we are brought back to the eternal truth of salvation through saving belief in Jesus. Nothing else will do if you want to have all your sins forgiven and spend eternity in perfect bliss with God rather than remain unforgiven and spend eternity in torment apart from Him. (I haven’t mentioned the eternal lake of fire in this series, but I assure you that it’s a very real place, a place where all of history’s unbelievers end up.)

Consequently, all that is left to be asked is, “Have you placed saving belief in Jesus and thereby experienced salvation?” If you haven’t done so, I beg you to do it now. Even if you think you might have but aren’t 100% sure, I beg you to do it now. (If you are already saved, God won’t penalize you for trying to get saved again.) What a shame it is that even though Jesus has paid the sin bill for the entire human race, the vast majority of people walk around unsaved. But you don’t have to be in that majority. I’ve explained to you, as best I can, God’s plan of salvation. Now it is up to you to decide what you will do with that plan.

Posted in Assurance of Salvation, Belief, Christ's Death, Demons, Eternity, Evangelism, Faith, God's Judgment, Grace, Heaven, Hell, Repentance, Salvation, Series: "Salvation", Sin, The Old Testament Law, The Trinity, Witnessing | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Jesus: The Final Blood Sacrifice

Posted on June 2, 2025 by russellmckinney

“Salvation” series: (post #7)

We are in a series on the all-important subject of salvation, and the last couple of posts have dealt with blood. One explained the theological concept of blood atonement, and the other one traced the offering of blood sacrifices down through the Old Testament era and into the early decades of the New Testament era. Now, with all that foundation firmly in place, we are ready to bring Jesus Christ front and center.

Jesus left heaven and came into this world to be nothing less than the one, final, all-encompassing, all-sufficient, eternal blood sacrifice for every sin the human race had ever committed and would ever commit. Because of that, the blood He shed in dying on the cross put a permanent end to the need for any more sacrificial blood. I’ll cite seven passages here (all from the N.K.J.V.) because seven is a good Biblical number, but there are other passages:

  1. Matthew 26:28: (Jesus speaking) “For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.”
  2. John 1:29: The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”
  3. John 1:35-36: Again, the next day, John stood with two of his disciples. And looking at Jesus as He walked, he said, “Behold the Lamb of God!”
  4. Ephesians 1:7: In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace.
  5. 1 John 1:7: But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His son cleanses us from all sin.
  6. Revelation 1:5: and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler over the kings of the earth. To Him who loves us and washed us from our sins in His own blood.
  7. Revelation 5:8-10: Now when He had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each having a harp, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song, saying: “You are worthy to take the scroll, and to open its seals; For you were slain, and have redeemed us to God by Your blood out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation. And have made us kings and priests to our God; and we shall reign on the earth.”

You’ll notice that in that first passage (Matthew 26:28) Jesus speaks of the wine He used during The Lord’s Supper, and He explains that the wine symbolized His blood. Then He associates His blood with a new covenant. The Greek word translated as “covenant” is diatheke. It is the same word that oftentimes gets translated “testament.”

The point is that just as God entered Himself into a covenant with the people of Israel in Old Testament times — that’s where the term “Old Testament” comes from — anyone who places his or her belief in Jesus as Savior enters into Christ’s new covenant (testament). And just as the Old Testament covenant between God and Israel was based upon shed sacrificial blood, the New Testament covenant that Jesus instituted is also based upon shed sacrificial blood. The difference is, whereas there were thousands upon thousands of blood sacrifices offered during the days of the Old Testament, Jesus’ death on the cross serves as the only blood sacrifice required for the new covenant.

What must not be lost in all this, however, is the fact that there has always been just ONE plan of salvation. Going all the way back to God killing those animals in the garden of Eden for Adam and Eve, and running all the way up to Jesus dying on the cross, there has always been just ONE plan of salvation. Just because there was an old covenant and now there is a new covenant, that doesn’t mean the two stand in conflict or contrast with each other. To the contrary, the new covenant that Jesus created actually fulfilled the old covenant.

Let me explain. Adam and Eve eating that forbidden fruit did not catch God off guard. He knew in His perfect foreknowledge they were going to do it. Therefore, He already had in mind a plan by which He could provide them, as well as all their descendants, forgiveness of sin. That plan was all about Jesus. Did you know that Revelation 13:8 calls Jesus “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world?” As amazing as the idea sounds, in the foreknowledge of God, the lifeless body of Jesus hanging dead on a cross was a done deal even before Genesis 1:1.

Obviously, we are getting into the doctrinal waters of the Trinity here. Yes, the Bible really does teach that God is one God who has eternally existed in three distinct persons: God the Father, God the Son (Jesus), and God the Holy Spirit. There are various analogies that get used to try to illustrate God being a triune God, but I don’t think any of them are adequate. For example, just as water can exist in the form of running water, ice, or vapor, God exists in three distinct persons. Or, just as one male can play the roles of son, husband, and father, God can play the roles of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. I won’t say any more about the Trinity, but you can consult the following passages for further study: 1 Corinthians 15:24; 1 Peter 1:1-2; 2 John 2:3; John 1:1-3,14; John 20:28; Romans 9:5; Titus 2:13; Acts 5:3-4; Acts 13:2; 2 Corinthians 3:17; Matthew 28:19; James 2:19; Deuteronomy 6:4; 1 John 5:7.

Getting back to the plan of salvation, God always knew that humans would turn themselves into sinners, and He always knew that God the Son would shed His divine blood in dying for all their sins. But for reasons known only to God, God the Son would not literally come into the world and die that death until approximately 4,000 years after Adam and Eve’s sin. So, the question was: How could sinners who lived before Jesus’ death be made right with God? Answer: by offering up blood sacrifices.

What must be understood, though, is that the best the blood from those pre-Jesus sacrifices could do was COVER sin and stay the wrath of God from falling upon those who offered them. What that blood couldn’t do was eternally CLEANSE sins. This is seen in the Old Testament word “atone,” which simply means “to cover.” As God told the people of Israel:

For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement (a covering) for your souls; for it is the blood that makes atonement (a covering) for your souls. (Leviticus 17:11, N.K.J.V.)

But the divine blood that Jesus shed in dying can do much more than just COVER sin. That blood can eternally CLEANSE it. Read carefully the following passages:

For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins. (Hebrews 10:4, N.K.J.V.)

And every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But this Man (Jesus), after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God, from that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool. For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified. (Hebrews 10:11-14, N.K.J.V.)

You see, in a very real sense, the blood Jesus shed in dying authenticated all that blood that had been shed via all those Old Testament sacrifices. In God’s eyes, each one of those sacrifices had foreshadowed and pointed toward Jesus’ eventual death on the cross. Think of it this way: Whenever God watched an Old Testament sacrifice being offered upon an altar, He had one eye on that sacrifice and the other eye on Jesus (in the future) hanging dead on the cross. In that way, God could allow the blood from that sacrificial animal to cover the individual’s sins until Jesus could come in time and history and shed His blood in dying to cleanse those sins completely.

And that’s where we will put a period on this post. Next time we’ll talk about what it takes for you, as an individual, to get Jesus’ shed blood applied to your sins. Certainly His blood is sufficient to provide eternal cleansing for everyone’s sins, going all the way back to Adam and Eve’s, but His blood isn’t automatically efficient to do so. No, something is required on your part to get His blood applied to your sins. Come back next time and we’ll identify what that something is.

Posted in Christ's Death, Eternity, God's Holiness, God's Provision, Sacrifice, Salvation, Series: "Salvation", The Gospel, The Lord's Supper, The Old Testament Law, The Trinity | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Need for a Blood Sacrifice

Posted on May 30, 2025 by russellmckinney

“Salvation” series: (post #6)

In our last post, we looked at the concept of blood atonement. That is the idea of the innocent (sinless) dying by way of the shedding of blood for the guilty (sinful). Adam and Eve were the first people to learn about blood atonement as God killed either one animal or two in the Garden of Eden in the wake of the couple eating the forbidden fruit. The animal skins served as coverings for Adam and Eve’s bodies, while the shed blood served as coverings for their sins.

Following that event, Adam and Eve were cast out of the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:22-24). Presumably, the animal killing and the casting out took place on the same day, the day the couple ate the forbidden fruit. The lesson here is that sin, even sin for which you have received atonement, always brings consequences.

The indications are that Adam and Eve settled in a place not far from Eden. Sometime afterward, Eve became pregnant, giving birth to a son the couple named Cain. Then she bore a second son, one they named Abel. That’s when things took another disastrously wrong turn.

Genesis 4:3-5 says:

And in the process of time it came to pass that Cain brought an offering of the fruit of the ground to the Lord. Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat. And the Lord respected Abel and his offering, but He did not respect Cain and his offering. And Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell. (N.K.J.V.)

The question we need to ask is: How did Cain and Abel even have a clue that they each needed to bring an offering to the Lord? The obvious answer is that Adam and Eve had taught them about blood atonement. Apparently, Adam and Eve continued to periodically offer sacrificial animals after they were banished from Eden. Then once Cain and Abel were born, the parents passed the practice down to the sons.

Abel, being a keeper of sheep (Genesis 4:2), did as he was instructed and sacrificed some of the firstborn from his flock (Genesis 4:4). But Cain, being a farmer (Genesis 4:2), went rogue by bringing an offering of his finest fruits and vegetables (Genesis 4:3). And what was the problem with Cain’s offering? It was the same problem Adam and Eve’s fig leaves had once showcased: no blood. Therefore, God rejected Cain’s offering (Genesis 4:4).

You say, “Oh, c’mon Russell, you are reading too much into the story. God could have rejected Cain’s offering for any number of reasons.” Really? Then how do we explain Cain being classified as an apostate in the Bible’s book of Jude (Jude 1:11)? Remember that an apostate is someone who has fallen away from revealed truth. Think about it, the only way that Cain could have gone apostate is for his parents to have revealed the truth to him about forgiveness of sin only coming through blood atonement.

If you know your Genesis, you know that rather than kill an animal and bring it to God, Cain killed Abel (Genesis 4:8). God cursed him for that, after which Cain left home and made his way to a place called Nod, which was east of Eden (Genesis 4:9-16). At some point, he took a wife — a woman who had to be one of Adam and Eve’s daughters (Genesis 5:5) — and fathered a son named Enoch through her (Genesis 4:17). Cain then built the world’s first city and named it after Enoch (Genesis 4:17). Enoch was the beginning of the line of Cain, an ancestral line of spiritually lost people who were all doomed to die in the great flood (Genesis 4:18-24).

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Adam and Eve produced another son. They named him Seth, and through him Adam’s line of saved people continued (Genesis 4:25-26). That line culminated in Noah. And did Adam and Eve teach Seth not only the concept of blood atonement but also the specifics of how to build an altar, kill and animal, and offer the animal as a sacrifice to God? Yes, they did. Let me explain how we know this to be true.

One thing you might not have heard about Noah is that he knew about blood atonement and how to offer blood sacrifices to God. The proof is found in Genesis 8:20. That verse identifies for us the first thing Noah did once the ark was unloaded in the new world. The verse says:

Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and sacrificed on it the animals and birds that had been approved for that purpose. (N.L.T.)

Someone might ask, “But if there were only two of each kind of animal aboard the ark, does that mean that Noah made those sacrificed animals extinct?” No, the explanation is that God had told him before the flood to collect seven (not two) of every type of animal that was “clean” and bring them into the ark (Genesis 7:2). A “clean” animal was a species that was eligible, in God’s eyes, for sacrificing.

The real question, though, is: Who taught Noah how to build an altar, kill animals, and offer them as sacrifices to God? Well, it must have been his father, Lamech, who had learned it from his father, Methuselah, who had learned it from his father, etc., etc., etc., all the way back to Seth.

Noah then taught the practice to his three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth. How do we know this? We know it because one of Shem’s descendants, Abraham, periodically built altars in his travels (Genesis 12:7; 12:8; 13:3-4; 13:18; 22:9), and on at least one of those altars he sacrificed a ram (Genesis 22:13). Furthermore, Genesis 22:7-8 clearly shows that both Abraham and his son, Isaac, understood perfectly that a built altar goes hand in hand with a sacrificed animal.

So, while it’s true that Abraham’s father, Terah, worshiped false gods in Ur (Joshua 24:2; Genesis 11:27-30; Acts 7:1-4), the family tree must have contained some remnant of the idea of building altars and offering animal sacrifices. How else would Abraham, upon his arrival in Canaan from Ur, have known that building an altar was a legitimate act of worship? And if Abraham ever needed a refresher course on the value that God placed upon the shed blood of animals, he got it when God instructed him to kill a heifer, a goat, a ram, a turtledove, and a pigeon as part of the ceremony in which God formally entered Himself into a covenant with Abraham (Genesis 15:1-21).

It is not surprising, then, that Genesis provides us with accounts of Abraham’s descendants also building altars and, apparently, offering blood sacrifices upon them. For example, Abraham’s son, Isaac, did so long after Abraham’s death (Genesis 26:25). Isaac’s son, Jacob, did as well (Genesis 31:54; 33:20; 35:1-7; 46:1).

And you’ve heard of Moses, haven’t you? He was another of Abraham’s descendants. But have you heard that Moses understood the doctrine of blood atonement and the value of a blood sacrifice? What most people don’t realize is that Moses’ first God-ordained request to Pharaoh concerning the Israelites was not that Pharaoh would release them completely from their Egyptian bondage. Instead, the request was that Pharaoh would allow them to journey three days outside of Egypt and offer sacrifices to God (Exodus 3:18; 5:3), sacrifices that would require the deaths of certain types of animals (bulls, rams, cows) the Egyptians considered sacred (Exodus 8:25-26).

As we know, Pharaoh refused that request and dug in his heels against Israel’s God. In the end, however, God won the victory by laying waste to Egypt through ten devastating plagues. The tenth plague was one in which God killed all the firstborns in Egypt in one night. But none of Israel’s firstborns were killed. Why not? It was because God gave the Israelites highly detailed instructions as to how each family was to kill a lamb and smear its blood on the tops and sides of the door frame of their house. God said, “When I see the blood, I will pass over you” (Exodus 12:13). This was the beginning of the Jewish holy day known as Passover. Passover is the celebration of the night that scores of lambs died so that scores of Israelites could live.

Following that first Passover night, Moses ultimately led the Israelites to Mount Sinai. There, God imparted to them His law. And, not surprisingly, He built into that law various commands concerning the offering of blood sacrifices (Leviticus 1:1-17; 3:1-17; 4:1-35; 5:1-13). That explains why the rest of the Old Testament features an assortment of references to the people of Israel atoning for their sins by offering blood sacrifices to God. In the beginning of the law period, those sacrifices were offered upon the altar at the Tabernacle. Later on in Israel’s history, when the Temple was built to replace the Tabernacle, the sacrifices were offered upon the Temple’s altar.

And so, we see that what started in the garden of Eden with Adam and Eve wound its way down through Noah and his sons and eventually wound its way down through the centuries of the history of Israel. Even more than that, it continued on even into the early days of the New Testament. That’s when Jesus Christ came upon the scene. He would be the one to bring an end to blood sacrifices. He didn’t do away with the doctrinal concept of blood atonement, but He did change how the need for a blood sacrifice would be met. And that’s what we’ll talk about next time. See you then.

Posted in Christ's Death, God's Provision, Sacrifice, Salvation, Series: "Salvation", Sin, The Old Testament Law, Worship | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Blood Atonement

Posted on May 28, 2025 by russellmckinney

“Salvation” series (post #5)

When Adam and Eve became sinners by eating the forbidden fruit, God had all kinds of options as to how He could have responded. He could have given them a good scolding, patted them on the heads, and said, “Now don’t do that again.” He could have thrown down a couple of lightning bolts to kill them on the spot and created another man and woman to replace them. Or He could have deleted all of creation, including them, and started the whole Genesis chapters 1 and 2 process all over again from scratch for another try.

But God didn’t do any of those things. Instead, He personally came down to Eden and pronounced various judgments upon Adam, Eve, the serpent, and Satan (who at the time was still inside the serpent’s body). And then He did something completely unexpected: He shed blood in the Garden of Eden. As Genesis 3:21 says:

Also for Adam and his wife the Lord God made tunics of skin, and clothed them. (N.K.J.V.)

And the Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them. (N.A.S.B.)

And the Lord God made clothing from animal skins for Adam and his wife. (N.L.T.)

You’ll notice that Genesis 3:21 doesn’t explicitly say that any shedding of blood took place that day. This leads some to contend that presenting the event as the world’s first blood sacrifice is a faulty interpretation. As the critics say, “Preaching that God shed blood in the Garden of Eden in order to cover Adam and Eve’s sins is reading way too much into a verse that merely explains that God made clothes for them.” However, the killing of either one animal or two (perhaps God killed one animal per person) is undoubtedly implied by the use of the word “skin” or “skins.” For example, even though you don’t have to kill a sheep in order to sheer its wool and use the wool to make clothing, there is simply no way to make clothing from an animal’s “skin” without first killing the animal. No animal can live without its skin.

Furthermore, if Genesis 3:21 isn’t a record of the world’s first blood sacrifice, then why did Adam and Eve’s son Abel kill some of the firstborn of his flock and bring them to God as an offering? And why did God accept that offering but reject the bloodless offering that was brought by Abel’s brother Cain? (Genesis 4:1-7) For that matter, since neither Cain nor Abel had been born when God had made that clothing for Adam and Eve, how did those boys know to bring their offerings to God and how did Abel know that an offering should involve the death of an animal? The only answer is that Adam and Eve taught their sons what God had taught them about the importance of a blood sacrifice.

Further evidence that Adam and Eve taught their children about the necessity of a blood sacrifice when approaching God can be found in the New Testament’s one-chapter book of Jude. Jude’s purpose in writing his book was to warn the early church about apostasy, which is the falling away from revealed truth, and as examples of apostates, he cites: the unbelieving Israelites from the Exodus story (v.5); the angels who did not stay in their rightful place (v.6, read Genesis 6:1-7); the citizens of Sodom and Gomorrah (v.7); Satan (v.9); the prophet Balaam (v.11); the rebels who sided with Korah against Moses (v.11); and Cain (v.11). As Jude verse 11 says:

Woe to them! For they have gone in the way of Cain…

You see, if an apostate is one who has fallen away from revealed truth, and if Cain is listed as an apostate, someone must have taught him some truth somewhere along the way. And that must mean that Adam and Eve taught him the truth about sacrificial blood. He then went apostate when he rejected that all-important truth by going “in the way of Cain” to bring God a bloodless sacrifice of harvested crops.

Getting back to God killing that animal or those animals in Eden, He was working on multiple levels by doing that. First, He wanted Adam and Eve to see firsthand what the horror of physical death looked like because up until those deaths they hadn’t had any visual reference on that subject. What a site it must have been for them to watch that red stuff begin pouring out of a lifeless body!

Second, since Adam and Eve’s sinful state had now created a newfound shame within them concerning their nakedness, God was addressing the practical need of them requiring clothing. They had tried to meet this need by covering themselves with fig leaves, but those fig leaves weren’t acceptable to God. So, He made them animal-skin (hide) clothing.

Third, and most important, God shed that blood in order to provide Him with a way to forgive Adam and Eve for their sin. What Adam and Eve did not know, because God had never told them, is that He holds to the concept of blood atonement. Blood atonement is the doctrine that says an innocent life can be taken as payment for the sin debt owed by a guilty life. What did that animal (or those animals) do to deserve dying? Absolutely nothing. In that sense, innocence was involved. So, why did God do that killing? He did it to provide a substitutionary sacrifice for Adam and Eve. It’s that simple.

They didn’t know it at the time, but God had just evidenced to them a couple of major theological truths that He would later reveal more fully to the human race. One of these truths is summed up in Leviticus 17:11, where God says to the people of Israel:

For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul. (N.K.J.V.)

This verse explains why God wouldn’t accept Adam and Eve’s fig leaves as coverings for them. Those fig leaves might have covered the couple’s nakedness, but they could never cover the couple’s sins. Why not? It was because those fig leaves didn’t have blood. It’s blood that indicates life, and the only way that God will accept a substitutionary sacrifice is upon the basis of life-for-life. Actually, Adam and Eve’s fig leaves have been called “the world’s first religion.” In other words, it was the human race’s first attempt at addressing the sin problem. But it didn’t work because it didn’t approach the problem in God’s way.

The other major theological truth that God killing those animals evidenced is very similar to the first and is summed up in Hebrews 9:22. There we read these vitally important words:

…and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. (N.I.V.)

Here again we see that for Adam and Eve to receive forgiveness for their sin, blood had to be shed. If their problem had been no more than them needing clothes, God could have handled that by merely shearing a couple of sheep, without actually killing the sheep. But Adam and Eve’s problem ran much deeper than that. They were now sinners, and God only forgives sin on the basis of blood shed via literal death. The innocent must die for the guilty. Anything short of that, and the sinner still stands condemned in his or her guilt. In that regard, fleeces from sheep wouldn’t have helped Adam and Eve any more than fig leaves did.

And here’s where we will put a period on this subject for now. Rest assured, though, that we will pick things up from right here in the next post. Now that we understand the concept of blood atonement, how far back it goes for the human race, and the incalculably high value God places upon it in regards to the forgiveness of sin, we can trace the concept down through history. Trust me, it will be an interesting ride. And where will it end? It will end with a man named Jesus dying on a Roman cross. Stay tuned.

Posted in Christ's Death, Death, God's Provision, Sacrifice, Salvation, Series: "Salvation", Sin | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment