Saturday, February 11, 2017

REFLECTIONS ON THE CROSS OF CHRIST: Why Did Jesus Die?

Fifty Reasons Jesus Came to Die (an overview of the atonement)

By Reverend Mark Hunnemann

1.to absorb the wrath of God
2.to please His Heavenly Father
3.to learn obedience and be ‘perfected’
4.to achieve His own resurrection from the dead
5.to show the wealth of God’s love and grace for sinners
6. to show His own love for us
7.to cancel the legal demands of the Law against us
8.to become a ransom for many
9.for the forgiveness of our sins
10.to provide the basis of our justification
11.to complete the obedience that becomes our righteousness
12.to take away our condemnation
13.to bring us to faith and keep us faithful
14.to make us holy, blameless, and perfect
15.to give us a clear conscience
16.to obtain for us all things that are good for us.
17.to heal us from moral  and physical sickness
18.to give eternal life to all who believe in Him
19.to deliver us from the present evil age.
20.to reconcile us to God
21.TO BRING US TO GOD
22.so that we might belong to Him
23.to give us confident access to the holiest place
24.to become for us the place where we meet God
25.the Eternal High Priest brings the Old testament Priesthood to an end.
26.to become a sympathetic and helpful High Priest
27.to free us from the futility of our ancestry
28.to free us from slavery to sin
29.that we may die to sin and live to righteousness
30.that we would die bear fruit for God
31.to enable us to live for Christ and not ourselves
32.to make the Cross the ground of all our boasting
33.to enable us to live by faith in Him
34.to give marriage its deepest meaning
35.to create a people passionate for good works
36.to call us to follow His example of costly love and humility
37.to create a band of crucified followers
38.to free us from bondage to fear of death
39.that we should be with Him immediately after death
40.to secure our resurrection from the dead.
41. to disarm the rulers and authorities (Satan/demons)
42.to unleash the power of God in the gospel
43.to destroy hostility between races
44.to ransom people from every tribe, language, people, and nations
45.to gather His sheep from around the world
46.to show that we are not saved by rituals or good works
47.to rescue us from final judgment
48.to gain His joy and ours
49.so that we would be crowned with glory and honor
50.to show that the worst evil is meant by God for good.  (see John Piper, Fifty Reasons Jesus came to Die).

Mark Hunnemann is the author of Seeing Ghosts Through God's Eyes: A Worldview Analysis of Earthbound Spirits. It's also available in eBook format.