Consider him who endured such hostility against himself from sinners, so that you may not grow weary or lose heart. In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. Hebrews 12:3-4 NRSV-CI
Jesus represented Israel and us to resist sin, something we could not do because we have colluded with sin to become its slave thinking we will preserve our lives by doing so, but only to find that by doing so, we're actually imprisoned in death.
And because Jesus resisted sin, sin in its fullest of force killed Him who resisted it. (The devil thought that by doing so, it had defeated God, but it was shocked to find that God made it a fool instead.) And because we're enslaved by sin and the devil, we became coconspirators of Jesus' murder. Our sin or our collusion with it, our failure to deny and resist sin, brought about the death of Christ. Christ indeed died because of our sins and for our sins, because He resisted in our stead. On our behalf Jesus resisted and died, for our sins and because of it. Jesus did for us what we could not do so that we may be free from sin which overpowers and controls us, and Jesus did it even when it meant giving away His life. He resisted evil and sin on our behalf, for our sake because we are hopelessly powerless to do so, in order that we might find freedom from it and live.
Jesus represented what we could not do and died for it. Because of that, when we repent and pledge our faithful allegiance to Christ through baptism, joining Christ in His death, we too resisted sin and died to it as Christ did in order that we might defeat it like Christ and inherit the hope of life in His resurrection.
When we partake of the bread, we are acknowledging and enacting this truth that we have pledge to die with Christ and resist sin in order to receive His forgiveness to live the life of Christ in the newness of faith. That's why if we partake of the bread, but live in sin, we are hypocrites doing the opposite of what we pledge and confess in the communion, which is sacramental reenactment of our union and covenant with Christ to resist sin to the point of death until He returns.
Comments