GOD’S RESUME: HE SAVES
Hebrews 1:3 (NIV 1984) After he had provided purification for sins…
We have here a qualification that addresses our greatest need as humans. If we found a god who was glorious and beautiful in absolute purity, righteousness, and holiness, we would find ourselves unable to relate to that god because we are not that. We are impure, unrighteous and unholy (Ps 53:1-3; Rom 3:9-18, 23; 5:12; Gal 3:22). If I ever get deluded into thinking that the human race is basically good and on a positive trajectory, then all I have to do to cure that is observe human behavior around me, watch the news or, even more troubling, be honest with the wicked desires that reside within my own heart. The human heart is wicked and deceitful to the core, no honest observer of humanity can say any different (Ecc 9:3; Jer 17:9; Mk 7:21-22). This god we are describing would be unapproachable by such defiled humanity and would need to have the ability to transform them at their core, cleaning them up and making them something completely new and different.
Jesus came to do this very thing. He came came to purify us so that God would not longer be unapproachable (2 Cor 5:17; 1 Tim 1:15; Titus 2:14; 1 Jn 1:9), and we can’t do this for ourselves. Try to stop doing wrong. We can’t do it, can we? Oh, we might get by for a while, but I would argue that to make that happen we have to redefine the word “wrong”. Even if we could, we can’t take away the guilt of our past wrongs and remove their devastating affects. In the OT the priest would sacrifice animals to temporarily cover the sins and guilt of the people, but they had to keep making the sacrifices, and they had to make them for themselves as well, because they too were messed up. Jesus is the final sacrifice, once for all, and He didn’t have to cover His own sins, because in Him is no sin (Heb 7:27; 9:12, 27-28; 1 Jn 3:5). Well, I don’t think any other religion offers such a god. Perhaps this is the biggest thing that sets this God apart from all others. He purifies! He saves!
