I was not educated in all the ways of Christianity.  My parents took me to church, but even in the nineteen fifties and sixties, the focus was on the more “pleasant” aspects of Christian faith.  When Matt Chandler writes that some scholars and writers think that the slaughter of Jesus was too negative to contemplate, he is talking about atonement of man’s sin through the slaughter of The Lamb [Jesus].  Today, many struggle to comprehend this process because it is too gruesome but it was the major part of Jewish culture since the inception of their religion. Killing unblemished lambs was used to symbolize the cleansing of sin.  But of course, this is not “pleasant.”

Chandler also knows that the process of crucifixion is hard to take; the idea that a man could be hung from a cross and die such a painful death is too much for some, “too gross” he says.  Pondering what it would be like to be Christ on the cross makes many, many Christians uncomfortable.  He cites pastors who walk all around this issue without focusing on it because it makes church members squeamish.  It is not “pleasant.”  “People want to get away from the shame and the blood and the guts and the horrific slaughter of Jesus Christ and focus on something else with the cross out on the margins” [Chandler, 59].

I was raised in a “social justice” church, a church that was considered liberal by many standards but certainly not a church that centered too much attention of its attention on the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. 

So one might say, what is the problem?  The problem for Chandler is that the idea of sin, the idea of the blood of sacrifice, the idea of the cross is the main focus of The Gospels.  If you don’t look directly at these issues, you really don’t comprehend The Gospels— “the Gospel is bloody and horrific.”  Remember the premise of his book is that Christians today don’t know the “explicit Gospel.”  That’s why he spends several pages describing Jesus as the “Satisfactory Sacrifice”. 

As I read these pages, it is like a crash course in the role of ritual sacrifice in the Jewish faith.  He describes the blood that “was always flowing” in the tent of meeting and in the temple as Jewish believers lined up with goats, lambs, chickens or doves [depending on the Levitical rules of sacrificial tokens for certain sins].  Arteries were slashed as people made efforts to atone for their sins, “a river of blood is flowing out of the temple.”  Since the days of Moses, the people of Israel instituted a system of blood sacrifices based on the actions of their forefathers, Abel, Noah, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.  The idea is that to dwell in the presence of the Lord requires perfection.  Man is filthy, sin is filthy and God will not allow us to “belittle” His name by having dirty hands.  The way to cleanse ourselves of sin is to shed blood.  Read Hebrews 9: 22: “No one can come near me without blood.  Somebody’s got to pay for all of mankind’s belittling my name”; in short, if there is no shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness.

Is this “pleasant”?  No.

This is the system that the worshippers of God lived with for thousands of years.  It was brutal.  Lots of animals were sacrificed.  On top of that lots of people were killed.  The Old Testament is full of times when God took out His wrath on sinful man directly.  People tried to draw near to God and God would not allow that.  He killed people. 

So why?  Why is this whole worship of God so brutal?  The short answer is because God is Holy and we are not.  There is a huge chasm between God and man; God is the perfect Father and we are His imperfect children.  Chandler cites Psalm 24: 3-4 to make his point: “Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord?  And who shall stand in his Holy place?  He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false and does not swear deceitfully.  Who?  Nobody.

This is where God allows Jesus to enter the picture.  Jesus is the only one who can do this, the perfect one who can span the chasm.  Jesus is the one who said “The Old Covenant is fulfilled.  Drink this, the blood of the New Covenant.”  As I written in a previous post, to drink someone’s blood is anathema to a Jew, to be around blood is horrific, but that is what Jesus did.  He offered us His blood.  He took His place on the cross [our place] and allowed the full wrath of God to be absorbed into his being.  We deserved that full wrath.  Certainly, the spotless Lamb Jesus Christ did not deserve it. “The blade of God’s wrath penetrates the Son and bleeds him, and He absorbs the wrath of God toward mankind.”  On the Jewish Day of Atonement, one goat is led into the temple where the high priest confesses sins over the goat, takes a blade and bleeds that goat to death.  Another goat is lead into the wilderness where it is “carries away the sins of Israel.”  One goat receives God’s wrath and the other carries away the sins of a nation.  Jesus is not a goat, His is a spotless lamb led to the sacrifice.  For us.  It is not “pleasant.”  It may even make us feel guilty.  The images of Golgotha will certainly make us turn our eyes away.  This was the reason Jesus came to earth, to bridge that chasm, to fulfill the prophecy of John the Baptist who said “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.”  Jesus is not a “scapegoat,” but he serves that purpose.  He wipes our slates clean and connects all of us to God in a way we have never experienced before.  Relationship is possible with the Father for the first time.  There is hope in death as Jesus showed us that eternal life is possible. 

I went to prayer group at my church the other day [intercessory prayer].  One of my fellow intercessors said something profound that I would like to repeat because it fits this post so well.  She said “don’t forget, that to draw closer to God we have to go through the bad before we get to the good.”  That’s how I view the sacrifice of Christ.  Is it pleasant?  Of course not.  Does it make us squeamish?  Maybe.  Would it be so much easier just to ignore it and think more uplifting thoughts?  Yes, it would.

But it is the bad that we need to go through before we get to the good and we don’t even have to go through it.  Christ did that for us.  All we have to do is look squarely at His sacrifice and acknowledge it, appreciate it and honor it.

Know that He came to this earth so we could be connected to our Father.

That’s the “explicit Gospel.”