Fully Satisfied

A manager was asked by his laziest employee for a recommendation for another job.

The manager thought hard all night for something that would be honest without hurting the young man’s chances.

He finally wrote: “You will be lucky if you can get him to work for you.”

Even though he thought he was honest, he twisted the truth.

This is the trick of our enemy.

The important doctrine of propitiation can free us from one of his lies.

The word propitiation means “satisfaction.”

It can be defined this way: Jesus Christ shedding His blood on the cross and thereby satisfying completely the demands of the Law upon the sinner and turning away God’s wrath.

God can now righteously accept the sinner who believes in Jesus Christ.

Those of us who have received Christ as our Savior are forever removed from being under God’s wrath.

While there are many applications of this to our daily walk as believers, we will look at only one in this blog.

Because of propitiation, we can be freed from one of Satan’s lies: when we fail, we are not worthy of love and deserve only to be punished.

If we believe this lie, it leads to fear of punishment.

1 John. 4:18 from the amplified Bible says:

“There is no fear in love. Dread does not exist, but full-grown love turns fear out of doors and expels every trace of terror! For fear brings with it the thought of punishment, and so, he who is afraid has not reached the full maturity of love and is not yet grown into love’s complete perfection.”

So, if we believe this lie and fear punishment, we will not be able to cope with this internal conflict.

We will end up punishing ourselves by trying to make up for our sin or punish and blame others for our sin and failures.

If we believe the truth of propitiation, we will no longer fear punishment.

Because Christ bore all the punishment on the cross, so we do not have to punish ourselves or punish and blame others.

On the chapel wall at Eagle Village, a residential treatment center for boys near Hershey, MI, hang the portraits of two 12-yr.-old boys, Rich and Rosy.

The pictures bring to mind a tragedy that happened several years ago.

Boys from Eagle Village were on a canoe expedition on Lake Superior when they pulled ashore to make camp.

Rosy spotted something floating in the water, so he pushed off in a canoe to retrieve it.

Strong winds quickly blew him offshore.

The staff recognized his peril and started off in 2 canoes to rescue him.

When Rick saw that his best friend was in danger, he insisted on going along.

The wind tossed all 3 canoes until finally they capsized.

The staff members all made it to shore.

But Rick and Rosy were both lost in the depths of Lake Superior.

A plaque between the pictures is inscribed:

“Rick, who loved enough to give his life for another. Rosy, who was loved enough to have another pay that price.”

This story calls to mind how much our heavenly Father loves.

He loved us enough to give His Son to die as payment for our sin, satisfying God’s wrath.

We were loved enough that He would willingly make that sacrifice.

Propitiation is the demonstration of the power of the deep, unconditional love of God.

Are we free from Satan’s lie? If not, believe the truth of propitiation.

It is not enough to know the doctrine; we need to allow the truth to set us free!!!

Propitiation guarantees us that God’s wrath has been turned aside from us forever.

He will never get angry with us! God is satisfied with the blood shed by His Son, so we can celebrate with the absolute confidence that we are deeply loved by God!

What liberation propitiation brings us!

Blessings!
Pastor Ken Keeler