Bowman Community Church
2026-04-26
  • Everlasting God
  • Jesus Paid It All
  • Amazing Love (You Are My King)
  • Great Is Thy Faithfulness
  • Hear My Cry

      • Matthew 27:3–14ESV

  • Text

    1 John 4:9–10 ESV
    9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
    The Word of the Lord, Amen.

    Prayer

    Almighty God, you alone can bring into order our unruly wills and sinful affections:
    Grant us grace to love what you command and desire what you promise;
    that our hearts would be fixed on the source of true joy;
    Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.
    Amen.

    Introduction

    Because Mark doesn’t talk about the Gospel enough, I figured I would cover it with this text.
    I’m joking, of course. By God’s grace, each of us is regularly reminded to look to Christ.
    Today, I want to speak to you about one way this should look. Every Christian will give a hearty amen to the exhortation to “trust and look to Jesus” to face the challenges of this life. What is less clear to us is what that might mean. What does that actually look like in our thoughts and actions?
    I also want to offer you a helpful way of describing the Gospel to yourself and to others. It is true that the Gospel means “Jesus Christ died for your sins”—it absolutely means that. But it’s not just that… there’s more.
    So, the goal is to receive from this text an outline of the Gospel that is applicable to our thoughts and actions, and can be easily told to others. This outline already has a name, and that’s what I titled this sermon: “The Great Exchange.” Let’s start with the first of these two verses.

    God Sent His Only Son

    1 John 4:9 ESV
    9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him.
    Last year, I preached seven sermons on Psalm 107 focusing on the Love of God. In that series, the focus was on the steadfast love of God, the hesed of God.
    God explains that this love, in all its many forms, was made manifest in the coming of Jesus Christ. And Jesus did not come to rule above and away from us, but from among us.
    The first part of this Gospel outline is that God sent his only Son into the world He had made.
    Theology has a word for this: incarnation. The taking on of flesh. God took on flesh and dwelt among us, taking on the name Immanuel, “God with us.” He is with us.
    He was with us in the sense that he walked the dirt of this planet, ate its food, and bled on it. He was here because he was sent here by the Father, and the Father sent him because he loves you.
    Theology has another word that goes along with incarnation: condescension.
    Over 1,600 years ago, a Christian named Augustine described Christ’s condescension:
    “Man's maker was made man that He, Ruler of the stars, might nurse at His mother's breast; that the Bread might hunger, the Fountain thirst, the Light sleep, the Way be tired on its journey; that Truth might be accused of false witnesses, the Teacher be beaten with whips, the Foundation be suspended on wood; that Strength might grow weak; that the Healer might be wounded; that Life might die.” - Augustine
    God becoming man is already hard to understand—the Father being willing to not only send his Son here but to suffer the uncountable indignities he suffered is even more baffling.
    Why would God do this? Can you imagine giving your son over your enemies? The Bible is clear:
    Romans 5:8 ESV
    8 .. God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
    Just think about that. The God of black holes and billions of light years; the eternal, unchanging God of the universe, who has our entire lives laid before him—every impure thought, every unloving action, all our sin—he looked upon you and he looked upon me and declared: I love you. The Father said to his Son, “We shall save these helpless ones whom we love—you must go.”
    Do we think the Father had to persuade the Son to go? Did Jesus come down to die in protest?
    John 6:37 ESV
    37 All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.
    He has no grudge. He is not on his throne rethinking his saving you because of all the ways you’ve ignored him. We cast him away, yet he says to our souls, “I came for you, and I will never cast you out.”
    John 6:38 ESV
    38 For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me.
    John 6:39 ESV
    39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day.
    The Gospel begins here, with the love of God manifest in Jesus Christ—the Son who was sent.
    1 John 4:9 ESV
    9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him.

    Propitiation & The Great Exchange

    The next verse:
    1 John 4:10 ESV
    10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
    John says, “Here is love. Here it is. It all flows from here.”
    Listen to the lyrics of a song called “Late Have I Loved You”
    Late have I loved You Beauty so ancient, so new Late have I loved You You were within me But I was outside You
    You called and You shouted And You broke through my deafness You flashed and You shone Dispelled all my blindness
    There has been much debate throughout the history of the church on how exactly a person is saved. Is it all God, or do little rebellious dirt creatures have a part to play in their salvation?
    Listen again to God: “You did not love me, I loved you and showed you that love by sending my Son.”
    Would we wag our finger and correct the person who took a bullet for us, saying, “Remember, I helped! I said yes, please take this bullet for me!”
    Of course not. We would weep for their sacrifice and our lives would be changed.
    This is what the Gospel is and what it does. God loved us, sent his Son, and he died the death we deserved.
    This is where we behold the Great Exchange. Jesus did not only die the death we deserved; he lived the life we could never live.
    Let me explain.
    Look at that word “propitiation” in verse 10. If you aren’t familiar with this word, then it is truly my honor to introduce you to it.
    Go back with me over 2,000 years ago to our spiritual ancestors under the Old Covenant. Before Jesus, the people of God lived under the Law of God—there were many laws, priests, different sacrifices, and all the rest.
    There were sacrifices that happened all the time, and some that happened only occasionally.
    There was one pair of sacrifices that occured only once a year, on what was called Yom Kappur, the “day of atonement.” This was a serious day.
    Leviticus 23:28–30 ESV
    28 And you shall not do any work on that very day, for it is a Day of Atonement, to make atonement for you before the Lord your God. 29 For whoever is not afflicted on that very day shall be cut off from his people. 30 And whoever does any work on that very day, that person I will destroy from among his people.
    On this day, the high priest would take two male goats, and cast lots (roll dice) for them. This would decide the purpose of each of the goats.
    One of them would be slain and its blood would be sprinkled on what was called the “mercy seat.”
    This act, the slaying of an animal and the sprinkling of its blood, was part of the annual Day of Atonement, dealing with the sins of the people.
    What was the purpose in all the animal sacrifice in the Old Testament? To drive this point home: “the soul that sins shall surely die.” “God will by no means clear the guilty.” As Mark says, “There are no free sins.”
    This is very, very, bad news. We could slaughter every animal on this planet and not one of us would be cleared before God.
    Hebrews 10:3–4 ESV
    3 .. in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. 4 For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.
    Set the goats aside for a moment. Think of the Passover lamb. This sacrifice began right after the Israelites fled Egypt and Pharoah. This lamb was slaughtered and its blood was applied to the doorway of the house. If they did this, the angel of death that God sent would pass over their home. The blood protected them then, but it did not fully deliver them from the pending judgment of God.
    So if the sacrifice of all these animals could never truly take away sin forever, then what was its point? Merely to keep God’s people on life support? Or to teach only a lesson on God’s wrath?
    No, there was a much higher and deeper purpose to these sacrifices. They, all, were glowing neon signs pointing to the last sacrifice.
    1,500 years of animal sacrifice passed until one of the most startling things was said.
    1,500 years later, a man named John the Baptists was proclaiming that the Messiah had come. He said:
    John 1:26–27 ESV
    26 .. “I baptize with water, but among you stands one you do not know, 27 even he who comes after me, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.”
    John 1:29 ESV
    29 The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!
    With all that we’ve said, there should be one word that is screaming at you. Behold, the Lamb. The lamb? This is Messiah! John should’ve said the “Lord”, the “Messiah”, the “King”! No, he said the “Lamb.”
    For lambs get sacrificed. Jesus is the Lamb of God, whose sacrifice on the cross takes away our sin.
    Now let’s go back to the goats. Two goats, we’ve already talked about the first that was slain and its blood sprinkled on the mercy seat.
    If you ever wondered what on earth Peter was saying when he wrote about the “sprinkling” of Christ’s blood, this is what it means. His blood atones for sin.
    Something different happened with the second goat.
    Leviticus 16:21 ESV
    21 And Aaron shall lay both his hands on the head of the live goat, and confess over it all the iniquities of the people of Israel, and all their transgressions, all their sins. And he shall put them on the head of the goat and send it away into the wilderness…
    Please incline your hearts to this picture. The priest lays his hands on the goats head as a symbol of the sin being placed upon the goat. The word for this is imputation. The sins of the people are transferred or imputed to the animal, and it is sent into the wilderness, signifying that guilt has been taken away.
    Now, I’ll stop and make sure all these threads are brought together.
    God, in his grace, forgave the sin of his people through the sacrifice of animals. But it could never last and it could never save. So, when the time had arrived, he sent his son to become the final sacrifice all those animals pointed to. Christ, the anointed sacrifice, become our passover lamb. He became our scapegoat. It was his blood that sprinkled the seat and took all your sin away.
    Your sin and mine was imputed to him the moment you believed.
    Our terrible, beautiful salvation. Your salvation.
    How much have you sinned against God? How weak is your affection for him?
    What do we say to the Devil when he drags all our offenses back out?
    Galatians 2:20 ESV
    20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
    We say, “Jesus paid it all. Get behind me, Satan, you have no power over me. You are a defeated wretch and Jesus said he will never cast me out.”
    The reality is this: the moment you believed, a great exchange occurred. Not only was your sin imputed to Jesus, but his righteousness, goodness, and perfect obedience was imputed to you.
    2 Corinthians 5:21 ESV
    21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
    Philippians 3:9 ESV
    9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—
    His robes for mine: O wonderful exchange! Clothed in my sin, Christ suffered ‘neath God's rage. Draped in His righteousness, I'm justified! In Christ I live, For in my place He died.
    His robes for mine: God's justice is appeased. Jesus is crushed, And thus the Father's pleased. Christ drank God's wrath On sin, then cried "‘Tis done!" Sin's wage is paid; Propitiation won!
    (Outline update) God loved us, sent his Son to save us, and did so by taking our sin and giving us his righteousness.
    Propitiation speaks to the satisfaction of God’s wrath. It is exhausted.
    Imputation speaks to the way that this is done—God punishes our sin. Every single one, past, present, and future, punished in the person they were imputed to: Jesus. Imputation also speaks to how we can so boldly approach God.
    In the Great Exchange of the Gospel, our infinitely negative bank account has not merely been zeroed out, it has been infinitely supplied with the riches of knowing Christ.

    Conclusion & Application: There Is Therefore Now No Condemnation

    Hear now the words of God that are spoken for your comfort and assurance.
    Hebrews 10:19–23 ESV
    19 Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, 20 by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. 23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.
    The God who has forgiven you calls you to draw near to him. He calls you lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely, and to run—to run with endurance the race that is set before you. This race starts here and cannot end anywhere other than the embrace of God.
    Your flesh will fail. Your strength will fail. Your courage will fail.
    The world is seeking to offer you cheap and fake little christs to end your race early for. Comfort, entertainment, fleshly pleasure, and many others.
    The Devil will point to whatever area of life that he can to try and persuade you that you have sinned yourself out of God’s love.
    Each of these things, and more, conspire to break down your faith and weaken resolve. They want you to give in, even just a little, to despair. To laziness. To apathy.
    Each of us will be tested in these ways, and not just once. Many times these storms will billow in. Many times we will fail.
    None of this changes the fact that your sin has been forgiven and God’s love for you is like the Sun on a cool spring day. You must only open your eyes and breath it in.
    Repentance is like opening your eyes. It forces you to look at your sin. You must name it. But forgiveness is like breathing. It is the clearest and loveliest of air, especially when taken all the way in, and done regularly.
    Most importantly, God is for you, not against you. There is nothing between you and him, for Jesus said, “I will never cast you out.”
    Psalm 73:25–26 ESV
    25 Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. 26 My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.

    Prayer

    Let forgiveness like water flow into our hearts. Help us to remember the sacrifice of Jesus and to use it like a flood, quenching all the fires of anxiety, fear, and despair.

      • Psalm 44ESV

      • Exodus 13:14ESV

      • Psalm 89:15ESV

      • Isaiah 55:8ESV

      • Mark 4:36–40ESV

  • Thank You Lord
Bowman Community Church
mclugg@gmail.com
5303476130
http://www.bowmanchurch.org
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