Purification and Sanctification in the New Testament

Purification and Sanctification in the New Testament

The believers in Christ don’t depend on the blood of sacrificial animals for cleansing. The blood of Jesus shed on the cross satisfied all requirements for purification. He is God’s holy Lamb and His blood atoned for the sins of the world, once and for all. It is a spiritual Law! The Giver of Life became the Redeemer of life. No one else but God Himself paid the ransom for our sin. No one else is pure and perfect to take the place of a perfect sacrificial animal. He, the holy and the righteous One, took our punishment and we, the sinners, were set free. Incomprehensible love! How much higher are His ways than our ways!  The Prophet Isaiah, prophesied of the redemptive mission of God as Jesus the Messiah, saying, 

The Lord looked and was displeased that there was no justice. He saw that there was no one, he was appalled that there was no one to intervene; so his own arm worked salvation for him, and his own righteousness sustained him. He put on righteousness as his breastplate, and the helmet of salvation on his head; he put on the garments of vengeance and wrapped himself in zeal as in a cloak. (Isaiah 59:15b-17)

Jesus is referred in the Scripture as the Lamb of God. The Old Testament required a perfect young, male animal, without blemish (Exodus 12:05). Jesus lived a sinless life and satisfied the requirements, taking the place of the sacrificial lamb.  He is our Passover lamb that has been sacrificed (1 Corinthians 5:7). When John the Baptist first saw Jesus he referred to Him as the Lamb of God.  

Look! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! (John 1:36)

On the island of Patmos,  Apostle John received visions in an end-time context. He also referred to Jesus as “a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain” (Revelation 5:6). Later, he decrees that the believers will be victorious in defeating the Devil “by the blood of the Lamb” (Revelation 12:5) and assures the believers under persecution of the Lamb’s ultimate authority over eternal life and death. 

All inhabitants of the earth will worship the beast—all whose names have not been written in the book of life, belonging to the Lamb that was slain from the creation of the world. (Revelation 13:8)

 Apostle John also gives us a glimpse of Eternity in the New Jerusalem,

I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its Temple. (Revelation 21:22)

At the end of his testimony,  Apostle John describes the ultimate EHAD, where God and humanity regain their fellowship as designed in the Garden of Eden. The New Jerusalem is the old Garden of Eden! This is the “new thing” which God foretold through the Prophet Isaiah long ago: 

Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? (Isaiah 43:18-19)