The Court of the King: Paradox Number Three

All of us have cut ourselves at one time or another, and I would hazard to guess that most have had that blood stain a white shirt, a white pair of pants, or maybe a tablecloth, napkin or handkerchief. Blood washes out fairly well if you get to it quickly enough, but the longer it takes, the more it takes hold and the more impossible it is to remove without leaving some small trace.

So how can the Bible claim that Jesus' blood cleanses us? Or, as the old and new songs put it can, 'wash us white as snow'? This is exactly what the apostle claimed in 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, his Son, purifies us from all sin. (NIV)

Now, wait a minute. Let's look at what it takes to get blood out of something - say, fabric for instance. If the stain has set you have to loosen the stain first with lemon, or a salt and bleach solution, and then launder it - and then launder it again and again and again until the stain is gone (which we know it hardly ever is). There are some new products for removal of protein stains, but most of us would agree that no matter how good they are, once something is stained it is never as clean or 'pure' as it was to begin with. And yet there is that scripture claiming that blood can make us 'clean'.

One of my favorite old hymns is 'Are You Washed in the Blood of the Lamb', which is based on the New Testament scripture from Revelation. Chapter 7, verse 14 says: And I said unto him, Sir, thou knowest. And he said to me, These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. (KJV)

Made them white.

So, here is this week's paradox. Think of it. Picture it. A woman clothed, say in a pale dress, or, maybe a man wearing a white shirt and khakis. Suddenly, they are covered in crimson blood. It bathes them, soaking not only into the the cloth covering them, but into their skin - into their souls. Now, here's the real beauty of God's never-ending mysteries, this tide of blood does not cause stains - it makes them disappear so completely God does not remember them.

Wouldn't the people at Tide or Zout like to have that secret formula!

All joking aside the Holy Scriptures are quite clear that it is Jesus' blood - or his willingness to obey God and shed his blood - that cleanses us and takes away our sin. No stain remover needed - only belief that Jesus was and is who he says - the Son of God, the Savior, the One who came to reconcile sinful men and women to God. The Bible is quite clear:

Romans 3:23-25 ...for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood.... (NIV)

In closing I would like to quote two songs, one old and one new. Information on both follows at the end. Read the words and meditate on them and then ask yourself -

Are you washed in the blood?

Have you been to Jesus for the cleansing pow’r?

Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

Are you fully trusting in His grace this hour?

Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

Are you washed in the blood,

In the soul-cleansing blood of the Lamb?

Are your garments spotless? Are they white as snow?

Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

Are you walking daily by the Savior’s side?

Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

Do you rest each moment in the Crucified?

Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

When the Bridegroom cometh will your robes be white?

Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

Will your soul be ready for the mansions bright,

And be washed in the blood of the Lamb?

Lay aside the garments that are stained with sin,

And be washed in the blood of the Lamb;

There’s a fountain flowing for the soul unclean,

Oh, be washed in the blood of the Lamb!

Are You Washed in the Blood?
Elisha A. Hoffman, pub.1878

What can wash away my sin?

Nothing but the blood of Jesus;

What can make me whole again?