The Blood of the Lamb
I want to do another week on the Garlocks in their book Before We Kill and Eat You and get into some of the interesting stories of their interactions with these cannibals in Liberia.
At one point Ruth noticed that one of the people that worked with them would leave his duties and go with some men of the tribe to a compound outside of their area for a special ceremony. One day she asked if she could go with them, and he said yes, and so off they went and she watched as one of the Shaman (the priests of their tribe), would kill a chicken and spill some of the blood of this chicken on a rock and then dab a bit of the blood on the forehead of each of the men who had come along.
Assurance Through Christ
.On their way home Ruth asked, “why do you do this?" What's the meaning of this ritual?” And their friend said, “Oh it's to take away our sins.” She said “Do you really believe it does?” and he replied “We hope so, we hope so, but who can know?” And he shook his head sadly.
This is not uncommon in these types of environments for people to shed the blood of animals to atone for their sins. In fact that was the Jewish way, as we read in the Old Testament. There were great rituals in place and different sacrifices would atone for different types of sins. But I thought it was quite interesting, this man's uncertainty saying “well I hope this is going to work, I hope that this is going to atone for my sins.” The Christian on the other hand has assurance, assurance that Christ's death and the blood that he spilled atone for our sins.
And so we don't need to worry, we don't need to only hope that it might possibly appease the ‘gods’, but we can be sure that his blood which was shed atones for our sins if we put our faith in him.
Faith in Redemption
That’s the good news! That God won't hold our sins against us if we are covered in the blood of Jesus, the Lamb of God.
Good will towards God is not enough. Guilt over our sins is not enough. Doing amazing good things is not enough. It is faith in Jesus and faith that his blood covers us that will atone for our sins.
Where's your faith today? In a lifeless ritual such as these men went through? In yourself and the good things that you've been doing? Do you have no faith at all that your sins are forgiven?
Well come to Christ! Because Christ is the Lamb of God and He gave himself up and He spilled His blood so that all who come to Him in faith can receive assurance of the forgiveness of sins.
