Propitiation—Substitution—Reconciliation

Col.1:20 “And making peace through the blood of His cross, by Him to reconcile all things unto Himself...”

Christ did not die only to show God’s benevolence (compassion, generosity, kindness) towards man. His life alone could have done that, and in fact, did, but then the full expression of God’s character would not have been manifested. His death was not only a manifestation of God’s love—and of course, it was. His death revealed God’s justice in carrying out, Christ on the cross, all that was due to sin, and His love and mercy in doing so in the Person of His Son.

“God commended (to approve, endorse, to present praise as worthy of confidence, to deliver) His own love toward us, in that, while we were still sinners, Christ died FOR US. (See Rom. 5:6-10).

The Divine love glorified the Divine holiness and righteousness. That Christ became a sin-offering FOR US (2 Cor. 5:21 = Jhn. 1:14; Lk. 1:35), that it might deliver us from the merited (deserved) execution of the sentence due to our guilt, involved no compromise of the righteousness of Divine administration.

In inflicting the sentence on the sinner’s voluntary Surety, Christ Jesus our Lord, God, “while He cleared the sinner, did not clear his sins,” but executed His righteous sentence upon them. The ends of Divine justice were fully assured. This makes it possible to present Christ to a lost mass of humanity, in 2 Cor. 5:18-21.

Now, all can and must choose to receive that Christ was their personal Substitute who paid for and dealt with their personal sins. (Please see the type in Lev. 16:7-8 and see what Jesus said in Jhn. 8:21, 24). In this way only they are the ones reconciled to God by their Substitute Christ.