Episode Transcript
Hello. I'm Dr. Kylie Fisher.
Welcome to heavenly harmonies. One John four, verse ten, says here in his love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. What a wonder God's great plan of redemption is for us.
We catch glimpses of the depth of God's love in our hymn for today. Stay with me to discover how the song and can it be can draw us nearer to the heart of God. In this season, we have gone all through the life of Christ in song.
And when I say all through the life of Christ, we haven't had time to look at many details, really, but we've just been able to sort of catch glimpses of going all through from their manger right through to Calvary, through the resurrection of Christ, to his ascension and his high priestly ministry. And so this is our final episode in this season. And so I wanted to finish with a hymn that kind of encapsulates, I guess, as well as much as you can in one hymn.
And that sort of gives a nice summary, a nice overview of what we've been looking at. And so I've chosen the hymn and can it be by the prolific hymn writer Charles Wesley. And what I love about this hymn is that this really goes through the personal experience of salvation.
It traces through what Christ gave up for us and the motivation behind his tremendous sacrifice and also what that means for us in our personal life and how we can appropriate these amazing blessings and gain confidence and assurance from that. So, yeah, we're going to conclude this season with this absolutely magnificent hymn. And can it be.
So let's have a look at the first verse. And can it be that I should gain an interest in the savior's blood? Died he for me who caused his pain for me who him to death pursued. Amazing love, how can it be that thou, my God, should die for me? And those last few phrases of this first verse are then repeated as a refrain in this song.
Amazing love, how can it be that thou, my God, shouldst die for me? And so we have there a wonderful exclamation and then a question. Amazing love. That's the wonderful exclamation.
And that's really short and focused. And then we have this question. It's not a question that we can really answer.
Yeah, but it's just that poignant question. How can it be that thou, my God, should die for me? And this is the really amazing thing about Christianity and where, once again, there's a huge gap between Christianity true Christianity and every other system of religious belief or philosophy, which is that though we as humans have of our own free will, wandered away from God, he himself is the one that provides the ransom. And he does not provide the ransom to awaken love in his heart, but he gives the ransom because he loves us.
And that's the beauty of John 316. And that's why it's such a well loved verse. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son.
What an amazing truth. So let's explore these truths a little more deeply in this first verse, which says, and can it be that I should gain an interest in the savior's blood? Died he for me, who caused his pain for me, who him to death pursued. Now, when we read through the story of the gospels, we can see that Christ was persecuted and rejected by his own nation in terms of bloodline because he was born as a Jew.
And so, yeah, the jewish nation rejected him, even though they had been looking forward to the messiah's coming for over a thousand years. So Christ was rejected by the jewish nation. They told Pilate that they had no king but Caesar.
They wanted Christ to be crucified, and Pilate did not want to crucify Christ. He knew that it was wrong to do that. But finally he ratified that sentence, that the jewish leaders wanted to be pronounced upon Christ.
And the roman rulers mocked him. They arrayed him in a purple robe. They put a crown of thorns upon know.
He was finally nailed to a cross. And the cross was, as we've said, the instrument of torture, the ultimate instrument of torture of the cruel ancient roman empire. And so Christ was nailed to the cross by roman soldiers.
So all of these are facts of history that can't be denied. So we might think from that that the jewish nation rejected Christ. He was sentenced and he was killed by roman soldiers at the request of the jewish leaders.
And so we might say, well, it was the jewish leaders, it was the Romans that killed him. But is that all that the Bible says about this topic? Well, I would suggest not. Let's have a look in.
There's a few different places you could look. You could also look at Matthew, chapter 27. But we're going to look in Mark, chapter 15 and verse 33.
Mark, chapter 15 and verse 33. It says, when the 6th hour was come, there was darkness over the whole land until the 9th hour. So the 6th hour, this is roman time, was midday.
So there was darkness until the 9th hour, which is 03:00 in the afternoon. Now, this was the time, actually, we might look at Matthew as well. Matthew, chapter 27, now 03:00 in the afternoon, if you look in the Old Testament, was the time when the afternoon sacrifice or the evening sacrifice of the lamb was made by the priests in the temple every single day.
And on that particular day that Christ died, it was the Passover lamb that was to be sacrificed at that time. So continuing with Mark, chapter 15 and verse 34, it says, at the 9th hour, Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, eloy, eloy lama sabakhanai, which is being interpreted, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? And verse 37 says, Jesus cried with a loud voice and gave up the ghost. And so we can see from that that Jesus died at the very time that the sacrifice was offered in the temple.
The Passover lamb was offered in the temple. So turning back to Matthew, chapter 27 says that something very significant happened at that time. Matthew, chapter 27 and verse 51, which says, behold, the veil of the temple was rent entwined from the top to the bottom.
The earth did quake and the rocks rent. So at the time when Christ died, this extremely heavy curtain was ripped from top to bottom. No human hand could rip a curtain, that curtain that was suspended high above people's heads from top to bottom.
So clearly this was a supernatural act and it showed that there was no more significance to the earthly sanctuary services. And now Christ, the perfect sacrifice, had been offered. And so from that time, Christ was to be our intercessor before the father, which he commenced that work, I guess, 50, 53 days, inclusive.
After that time, he was on earth for 40 days. And then Pentecost was 50 days after the resurrection of Christ. So we see that Christ died at the very time the Passover lamb died.
And when that Passover lamb died, the lamb was not slain because it had done anything wrong. The lamb was an innocent creature, and the lamb was slain because of the sins that were laid upon him by the priest and that were laid upon him by the people. The lamb died in place of the sins of the people.
And that's the significance of the cry of Christ on the cross. As we've said in previous programmes, that Jesus cried out, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? And that was why Christ died. He did not actually die of crucifixion.
Crucifixion was a lingering, tortuous death and we don't have time to look at it in detail. But as you look through the four gospels, you can see that the two thieves that were crucified with Christ had not died because they were not suffering under the sins of the world. But Christ had already died.
And Mark, chapter 15 and verse 44 tells us that when Joseph of Arimathea came to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus, mark 15, verse 44 says, pilate marvelled if he were already dead. And calling unto him the centurion, he asked him whether he had been any while dead. Verse 45 says, and when he knew it of the centurion, he gave the body to Joseph.
And so Pilate was astonished that Jesus had died so quickly. But we find out the reason again, or another indication of the reason we've already spoken about how Jesus cried out and said, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? And we may recall also that Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, when he was with his disciples, he said, my soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death. And in the garden of Gethsemane, he sweat great drops of blood.
That was because of the weight of sins that was pressing upon him. But let's have a look at another verse that just really nails this. John, chapter 19, and verse 34.
John, chapter 19 and verse 34. And the soldiers again, they were astonished that Christ was already dead because he'd only been on the cross for 6 hours. And verse 33 says, john 19, verse 33 says, but when they came to Jesus and saw that he was dead already, they break not his legs.
Verse 34 says, one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side and forthwith came there out blood and water. And so these separate streams of blood and water show that Christ was not killed of crucifixion. He died of a broken heart.
And so we cannot look at the Jewish nation and the cruel, you know, as terrible as their acts were in rejecting Christ, in condemning Christ, and in crucifying Christ, the cause of Christ's death was not that cross. As cruel as the torture was, the cause of the death of Christ was our sins. So that's what this song is bringing out.
Died he for me, who caused his pain for me, who him to death pursued. And it is indeed such amazing love. So let's go on and think a little bit more about this tremendous sacrifice of Christ that's brought to view in the second verse.
It says, there he left his father's throne above, so free, so infinite his grace emptied himself of all but love and bled for Adam's helpless race. Tis mercy, all immense and free. For, oh, my God, it found out me what a glorious truth that is.
So this part emptied himself of all but love. Now again, we don't have time to look in detail at all of these things. I would encourage you to consider these passages carefully and prayerfully and they can really bring to life the message of this song.
But this is based on Philippians chapter two and beginning at verse five. Philippians chapter two and beginning at verse five, which says, let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God. So that's what it says at the beginning of this song, really.
He left his father's throne above Christ, was the rightful king of the universe by creation, and yet he left the glories of heaven. He left them for us. He was in very nature God, and yet he left all things, all of that for us.
Amen. Says verse seven. Says, he made himself of no reputation, took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men.
And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. So, yeah, he emptied himself. He gave up.
He forsook all that was rightfully his in heaven. He came down to this earth, but he came with a heart full of the father's love and what incredible mercy it is. Yeah.
And when we see the amazing love of Christ, that's the moment that we recognise that we are the chief of sinners. We all have that personal experience. So, moving on then to the third verse, the third verse of this beautiful hymn.
And can it be? And so this verse says, long my imprisoned spirit lay fast bound in sin and nature's night thine eye diffused a quickening way. I woke, the dungeon flamed with light. My chains fell off, my heart was free.
I rose, went forth and followed thee. You know, when I think about this third verse, what I always think about is acts, chapter twelve, the story of Peter when he was in the dungeon. Now, this verse is talking about our imprisonment due to sin, says, long my imprisoned spirit lay fastbound in sin and nature's night.
So, yeah, let's be very clear about the reason why Peter was in prison. Peter was not in prison because of his sins, though he had sinned. But he was not in prison because of his sins.
He was in prison for preaching Christ. In fact, the rulers of that time forbad Peter his right of free speech. And they said, if you're going to preach about Christ, you're going to prison.
But Peter kept preaching about Christ. And so he was indeed put into prison and he was threatened with death. And in this story, on the very next day he was due to be killed, martyred for the cause of Christ.
So Peter was not in prison because of his sin, but his experience. I do believe that. And this song shows us how that Peter's experience in that prison does reflect what it is like when we are bound in sin and freed by Christ.
It's really amazing. This is just an amazing story. We don't have time to look at it in detail, but it says that Peter was there, chained between soldiers and the keepers before the door kept the prison.
And so acts, chapter twelve, verse seven, says that while Peter was in this imprisoned state, he was chained to these soldiers. It says that the angel of the Lord came upon him and a light shined in the prison and he smote Peter on the side and raised him up, saying, arise up quickly. And his chains fell off from his hands.
And the angel said to him, gird thyself and bind on those sandals. And so he did. And he said unto him, cast thy garment about thee and follow me.
So Peter went out. He even went out through the great iron gate and then he was free. And so that's the scene I always have in my mind when I think about this third verse.
And that really is what it's like. Christ sets us free. My chains fell off my heart was free I rose, went forth and followed thee and then the fourth verse.
No condemnation now I dread Jesus and all in him is mine alive in him my living head and clothed in righteousness divine bold I approach the eternal throne and claim the crown through Christ my own and we've looked at these verses in previous episodes, so we're not going to take a lot of time to read through them, but I would encourage you to go over them in your own time. They're amazing verses. Hebrews, chapter four, verses 14 to 16.
Verse 16 says, let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time and time of need. So we can come boldly to that throne of grace. And so we are going to listen to the Eastwood music camp singers sing this incredible song.
And can it be this wonderful song that goes through the sacrifice of Christ for us and how he left all the glories of heaven for us? How through Christ we can experience freedom from sin and how we can also have confidence and assurance that through Christ we can gain that eternal crown, we can gain that crown of victory. So let's listen to this glorious song. And can it be, and can it be that I should gain an interest in the savior's blood di for me who cause his pain for me.
Who is that, my God, to die for you. I found Jesus night I use be rain. I gave me Sabrews 1019 and 22 says, having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith.
And what a wonderful privilege and blessing it is that through Christ we can have confidence that our sins are forgiven, we can know that assurance, and we can have that peace. So let's just say a brief prayer to ask God to make this to be true in our lives. Dear Lord, we are so grateful for the amazing love of Christ and just how much he gave up for us.
And he died for us, even though we were the ones that pursued him to death. And so, dear Lord, I just pray for each person listening to this broadcast. Dear Lord, we've all been too long imprisoned by the darkness and the chains of sin.
Dear Lord, I just pray that we can have freedom from sin and that we can experience and know that that freedom comes to us through Christ, through the death and resurrection of Christ, and through his high priestly ministry for us. So, yeah, just pray for each person listening to this broadcast that you will be with each 1 May they personally experience this amazing gift of salvation is my prayer. Please, in Jesus name, amen.
Thank you so much for joining me today on heavenly harmonies. We have come to the end of this season on the life of Christ. In following episodes, we will be starting a new season looking at a new topic, so please do join me again for that.
But until then, goodbye and God bless.
