Jesus Christ, Our Redeemer

Good afternoon, everyone! Great to be with you here on the Sabbath, especially a beautiful, sunny, at least start today to the day that we had. Hopefully the sun will stay out. Looks like it is. So I was thinking as I was preparing this message of a story that captivated me back when I was about 18 years old. In fact, I took a trip across the U.S. after my freshman year in college with a couple of friends. And we brought a book with us, and we were so interested in this story. We actually, over the course of this trip for several days, took turns reading this book out loud to each other. And it was a story of a man named Frank Abagnale Jr. Has anyone heard of Frank Abagnale Jr.? Not too many people. So it was a captivating story. This was somebody who was born in 1948, and when he turned 15 years old, he embarked on a six-year crime spree. And interestingly enough, related to the sermon that we had, the trigger for the whole thing was when his parents got divorced, and he became estranged from his father. And he just kind of threw everything in and took off and ran away from home. And the only way that he knew to support himself at that point in time was through stealing. And being somebody who looked a little bit older than he really was, and somebody who had just a magnetic personality, he was able to con and swindle people for six years. He was known by many people as the greatest con man who ever lived. He posed for a number of years as an airline pilot, as a lawyer, and even as a doctor. And he would talk about the strategies that he would use when he was a doctor, actually working in a hospital, of how he would make sure that he wouldn't actually have to give any medical advice. He was the most popular among the residents, because whenever an issue came up, he would turn to the residents and say, well, what would you do? And they would go ahead and solve the problem and move on. And he talked about one time when there was a doctor who actually moved into his apartment complex, he got really scared that this doctor would start asking him medical questions. So being the thinker that he was, he subscribed to a medical journal. And whenever he would see the doctor, he would ask the doctor about an article in the medical journal, which the doctor, of course, had not read, and then the doctor would just be quiet and wouldn't talk to him about medical topics. Probably his most interesting and maybe humorous con was when he went to the airport, and he saw that all of the different airline counters and the rental car counter at the end of the day had a lot of cash. And they would take the money in big bags, and they would drop them in a drop box, and then the armored car would come and pick it up.

So one day he took a sign, he wrote on the drop box, drop boxes out of order, leave money with the guard. And he went to a costume shop, and he bought a guard's uniform, and stood there with a bag next to this box. And people actually came and just started dropping bags of money in this bag that he was holding. Now, less children start getting ideas here.

The end of his crime spree did not really have a good ending. He spent the first six months after he was captured, he spent literally naked in a small prison cell in France, being fed very little, practically freezing to death, and becoming basically a shadow of himself. After that, he was extradited to Sweden, where he spent another six months in more humane conditions. And fortunately, the Swedish authorities decided to turn him back over to the U.S. rather than extraditing him to a string of other countries he was wanted in a dozen countries. He returned to the U.S., he served five years prison time of a 12-year sentence before he was finally freed. Now, what's so interesting and captivating about his story is, at the end of the day, he had to take a job helping the FBI as a part of what he did. He's now 71 years old, and he's had a 40-year association with the FBI, as well as running his own company as a fraud consultant for different corporations. So, despite all of these things that he did, he was able to turn his life around. And this story was so captivating. If you're interested in watching a movie sometime, Catch Me If You Can was the name of the book that he wrote. It became a movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio a few years ago. There was also a Broadway musical made about his life. And if anyone watched the old TV show White Collar that was on for probably five or six seasons, that whole show was built on the premise of Frank Abagnale Jr.'s life. Now, it's interesting. I've kind of puzzled about it. It seems like there's something in us as human beings that likes these types of stories.

Somebody who's had difficulties, somebody who's gone through trouble, somebody who's made bad decisions, and comes back around at the end of the day, is able to turn the life around, become a productive member of society, and help other people. And again, I'm not sure if that's something that God's put in us, just as human beings, but we have some sort of realization that we're not good enough, but we want to be able to be better than we are. Or if it's a cultural thing in the way that we're raised. But I think if we reflect on it, we all love these stories, these stories of redemption. Somebody who's able to take a situation that's gone very badly because of poor decisions and turn it around. For those of you who like topics or like titles, the title for the sermon today is Jesus Christ, Our Redeemer. I'd like to spend the rest of the time today talking about the topic of redemption. Now, what is redemption? So we talk about it in the context of this story, for example, that I just laid out. We talk about it in much more trivial contexts as well, right? We go to the store, we redeem a coupon, we get our $10 off of Kohl's Cash, and then we get the money off by redeeming the coupon, and we walk away with the discount that we get. We use the word in so many different ways, but what is redemption, really? What does it mean?

Think for a moment about what comes to your mind. How would you define redemption? I'd like to start off by looking in the Old Testament. There are actually three concepts of redemption, three different Hebrew words that are used and translated into the English word redemption in the Old Testament. Then we'll turn and talk a little bit more and think more about what it means to us as we live our Christian lives.

The first word is transliterated into English as pada, p-a-d-a, and it refers to substitution, something that's substituted for something else to be delivered. If you'll turn with me to Exodus 13, we'll see an example where this word is used, substitution, where one thing is substituted for another.

Exodus 13, we'll start in verse 11.

Hear God talking to the Israelites. Exodus 13, 11 starts out, Therefore I sacrifice to the Lord all males that open the womb, So this might sound a little bit odd in modern context, but God was saying, as you set up your society, you set up on the land that I gave you, you're going to remember every time there's a firstborn male, whether it's in your flocks of sheep, whether it's in your herds of cattle, whether it's in your household, you have a firstborn son, and it uses this word, pada, to redeem. You're going to trade something for that firstborn, because the firstborn belong to God. And it's instructive at this time of year as well, as we look back and we think about the Exodus, because he wanted, as every firstborn was born, the people to remember what it was that God had done for the children of Israel, bringing them out of Egypt. And there was a replacement, a substitution, that had to happen through this redemption payment. Those lives belonged to God, the firstborn belonged to God, it was a reminder of what he had done, and there was a mechanism set up where those people would be redeemed, or that cattle, the animals would be redeemed, substituted, something else brought in its stead, so that it could have freedom, it could be delivered, and could live its life.

So the first context, or the first word, pada, or substitution. The second word that's often used in the Old Testament for redemption is gal, G-A-A-L. And this refers a little bit differently to the deliverance of a person, property, or right, to which one had a previous claim, either through family relation or through possession. Let's turn to Leviticus 25. We'll see a couple of instances of this laid out in Leviticus 25. So this is a little bit different because this refers to a situation where property or person's freedom has actually gone away, and it needs to be restored through a redemption. We'll start with Leviticus 25. We might be familiar with some of these laws that existed as civil statutes for ancient Israel. Leviticus 25. verse 23.

Because of that, there's certain regulations that need to apply.

Okay, so God has set out a specific law here that does not estrange people from the land. There's always a right to come back to that land. Again, that's because it was the land that God gave to them as the promised land, and God was enforcing the fact that this land was His. He's letting the children of Israel use it. He's letting it be assigned to them, but it's His land.

But this mechanism I find really interesting, because what He's saying is that if you lose your land through mismanagement, through laziness, through illness, through death, through whatever, you might lose that land, but anyone in your family can come back and can claim it by making this payment. And there's actually an economic, I'm being a numbers geek, there's an economic principle here as well, where He says the land is worth whatever you can grow on it over the course of the next number of years until it reverts back in the Jubilee. So there's a specific valuation as well assigned to how the price of that land goes. But what's really instructive here is there's no ability for the person who took possession of that land to keep it. So if you've got a big family, you've got five brothers, and you lose the land, you've got potentially five people who can come back to the person who got that land and buy it back. And there's no option here for the holder of the land to say, no, I'm going to keep this land. Because this law of redemption, to be able to go and deliver something out of the hands of someone else through a payment, existed. There's absolutely no escape clause from it. So as long as there's somebody who has a rightful claim through family, the person who's holding that land is required to sell it back to them for the price that we see demonstrated here. Let's go on a little further, and we'll read verses 47 through 49. Verses 47 through 49. Now, like other civilizations at this point in time, the laws given to ancient Israel allowed for indentured servitude because of defaulting on your debts.

Now, in times past, some of these things that are written in the Bible regarding slavery have been used as horrible excuses to abuse other people, and that's not what is sanctioned here. But the Bible does leave open situations where people become bankrupt, and as a result of bankruptcy, go into servitude for another person. Leviticus 25, verse 47.

So just like land can be delivered out of the hands of someone else and restored to the family, likewise a person who's gone to bankruptcy, who's gone to nothing and essentially sold himself into indentured servitude can be rescued from that by a close family member. And again, just like we saw in the law for land, there's no opportunity for the person to say, no. You know what? I like him. He works hard. I'm not going to let him be redeemed. There's absolutely no option for that. The person has to sell the person back for that—or free the person—for that redemption price. We won't turn there, but for those who are interested, you can also read in Ruth 4, verses 1 through 6. You might remember the story of Ruth and Boaz, and that entire scenario that happened in Ruth 4 is Boaz going through that process of redemption exactly like these laws pointed out. So these laws worked in their civil society for quite a number of years. That's in Ruth 4, if you're interested in looking at it.

There's one other word, a third word, that's translated as redemption in the Old Testament, and that word is kapar or kafar, K-A-P-A-R, or you might see it spelled K-A-P-H-A-R, and it means to appease or a covering or by extension a redemption price. And so this is referring to a situation where you pay in order to cover sin to atone for something or make expiation for something. Let's turn to Exodus 21, and we'll see one scenario where this happens. Again, this redemption is one that covers for a sin or to atone for an infraction that's happened. Exodus 21. Here we're reading some of the other civil laws that were used in ancient Israel to run society. Exodus 21, verse 28.

It's serious. It's caused a human death. So you kill the animal, you destroy it. Now in verse 29, if the ox tended to thrust with its horns in times past and has been made known to his owner, and the owner has not kept it confined so that it's killed a man or a woman, then the ox shall be stoned and its owner shall be put to death. So nowadays we talk about negligence or gross negligence that might happen, and that's what's being pointed out here as well, right? The owner knows that this ox has been violent in the past and caused danger to other people, didn't bother to confine it to protect people. Now the owner is responsible. But look at what happens next in verse 30. If there is imposed on him, meaning the owner, a sum of money, then he shall pay to redeem his life whatever is imposed on him. So there was provision made here, even in a situation like this. We see this sometimes still in some Middle Eastern societies where there are redemption payments made when there's an accident or when perhaps there's manslaughter that's taken place. And it was laid out, and I don't know, I haven't seen exactly what all of the other conditions might be around this, but apparently it's a negotiation between the family of the person who's been killed by the ox, and there's a payment made in order to not put the person to death. And when you think about it, it makes sense. If you're living in a village situation, you're probably friends with your neighbors, terrible things can sometimes happen, and you're not necessarily going to take a thrill out of seeing your neighbor killed because your child, or perhaps your wife, died in an accident with an animal. So this makes a provision for redemption payment something that makes up that difference. And even today in legal books you can see there are even sums of money in U.S. law put on a finger, a hand, an arm, different parts of your body that you might lose. And there's actually law and precedent to what kind of payment you might receive if you have a work accident, for example, where you lose an arm or you lose a leg. It goes back to principles like this. Let's turn to one other where we'll see this word, kapar, or kafar, meaning to appease, a covering, or a redemption price. That's Exodus 30, verses 11 through 13. Exodus 30, verses 11 through 13.

And this is God speaking with Moses shortly after the Ten Commandments were given, as he was giving instruction again for things that were going to be happening as ancient Israel began to set up their society. Exodus 30, starting in verse 11.

Half a shekel, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, a shekel is twenty geras. The half shekel shall be an offering to the Lord. Now, this seems really weird, doesn't it? When you read that, you say, what in the world is going on here? And it is kind of strange to take apart. But what's happening here is to take a census, to count, implies ownership. You can't typically go into your neighbor's house and start counting how many cans of beer he has in the fridge, right?

It's not your house, it's not your refrigerator, it's not your beer. So, what's being implied here is the fact that the people of Israel did not belong to themselves, they belonged to God. And if they were going to take a census, it was not a census of saying, look how strong our army is, look how many fighting men we have. They had to make a payment, they had to make a payment here in order to associate the fact that they didn't own themselves.

And it uses this word to cover sin or to atone. And it talks about the fact of a plague coming on them if this payment isn't made. Now, can we think of another example in the Bible where this happened? You might remember King David. If you want to turn there another time, 2 Samuel 24 is the passage to write down. King David, at one point in time, got real impressed with Israel, how strong it was and how many people there were.

So much so that he took a census. And after that census, he was punished through a plague. There was no redemption price paid. There was no recognition in that situation that the people belonged to God. David took a census saying, hey, look at this, this is my fighting force, this is my army, this is my strength. And God brought the plague on. No redemption price was paid. No recognition was there as he was making that census that these aren't my people. These are God's people. It's God's strength and it's his mighty arm that delivers me. And because he didn't recognize that, because he didn't make this payment, God brought on the plague.

So as strange as this verse might sound, it does hold together with the way that God operated with his people. So now is the point, like in many of my sermons where everyone is saying, so what? Why does this all matter, right? Why do we need to know this? Well, redemption is something, as we're going to look at now, that has a lot of meaning to us, especially this time of year.

Jesus Christ is our Redeemer. And when we start to think in the context of these different meanings that we see in the Old Testament, we can start to see the different ways that Jesus Christ, in his life, is given as a redemption for us. I'm not going to go one-to-one against these Hebrew words, but I have pulled out a few different ways, or a few different things that we see in these examples of redemption, that gives more depth to how Jesus Christ operates in our lives.

And it's something, this time of year, as we think about our lives, and you've probably already been thinking about it as we went through these early points, that we need to think about ourselves and how we view our lives, what is our own, what we can do as our own, why we are free as Christians, freed from our sins, and everything that was behind us. And it all comes because of redemption and Jesus Christ as our Redeemer. So, as we look at how redemption relates to us in a Christian context, let's start, first of all, with realizing the cost of redemption.

That would be the first thing I'd like to spend a few minutes on. Realizing the cost of our redemption. There is a price. So the common theme of all of these usages of redemption in the Old Testament is what? Something is given, right? There's a redeeming price that's paid. If the ox kills somebody, the owner doesn't just say, I'm sorry, look, my bad. There's a payment that's made. There's a price that's paid. In every one of these examples that's there, a payment is made, a substitution, right?

The first example I gave, all the firstborn that were born, something had to be given in order to redeem them. So there's a price. And when we look at our Christian lives, what is it that's precious and pure that was given for our lives? Of course, we know it's Jesus Christ.

Turn with me, if you will, to 1 Timothy 2. We'll read verses 4 through 6.

1 Timothy 2, verses 4 through 6. There's a price that's been paid for our lives. The very fact that we're sitting here, the fact that we know God's way, the fact that we can have forgiveness through Jesus Christ, all came with a price.

And as we close in on the Passover, it's important for us to sit back and think about that. It's easy for us to go on blissfully in our lives, especially when things, we might be in a spot where there aren't that many things that have gone wrong for a while, and just think, hey, life is great. And we can forget the price that was paid for this. 1 Timothy 2, verses 4 through 6.

Here Paul says, talking about God, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ, who gave himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time. So the ransom is what's something that's paid when something is redeemed. And so we can think back to these passages, we think of what ancient Israel was asked to do every time there was a firstborn born. They were asked to pay a ransom, a reminder that they came out of Israel, or they came out of Egypt, that God had saved them, that the firstborn of the Egyptians died, but not the firstborn of the Israelites. And that payment was made in remembrance of that, to always remember and have in front of them that there was a price. So it was a price that had to be paid in order for them to be living in the Promised Land, to have the property that they had around them, to have the fields, the homes, and everything that they had. And likewise, we have to remember, we do it annually through the Passover, but we remember that there is a price to be paid for what we have. And it's important for us to reflect on that price, to realize the value of what we have. Not everyone has been called by God. We know that from what we read in the Bible. Not everyone has had their sins forgiven of them. Not everyone has the new life that comes through Jesus Christ. We are able to enjoy that. We're able to live a new life, and it came with a price, one that we have to be grateful for. Turn with me, if you will, to Mark 10, verses 42 through 44. Or 45. Mark 10, 42 through 45. Because it's more than just realizing there was a price to be paid, because as we realize that, it changes our behaviors as well. Somebody gives you something incredibly precious. If you were, for example, to enter a lottery and win a brand new car, I mean the value of a new car, tens of thousands of dollars, and you're driving down the street in your brand new Cadillac, you realize that you've been given something of great value, don't you? And you treat that car differently, until you get tired of it, perhaps. That's how we are as humans. But if you're given something of great value like that, you treat it carefully, take good care of it. You realize what you've been given. Mark 10, verses 42 through 45. Here Jesus calls the disciples to Himself, and He says to them, You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you. But whoever desires to be great among you shall be your servant, and whoever desires to be first shall be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many. So again, He defines Himself as the ransom, the price that was paid. But He ties that into a way that He lived His life, serving, and by extension, the way that we have to live our lives, in service to other people. So the question, as we examine this and think about the price that was paid, as we move into the Passover, is, in my mind, twofold.

Number one, do we realize the value that was given to redeem us? I know it's not necessarily something we think about every day, but it is something we should think about and reflect on as we move into the Passover time period. The value of what was given to redeem us.

And then secondly, in what ways do we live our lives as a sacrifice, giving the value that we have in our lives in order to help other people as a result of realizing what was given for us? That's what's related to the price of redemption. Let's go secondly to another element of redemption, I think you'll recognize quickly as we read through it, that was in some of these examples we read in the Old Testament. What is the care that's involved in redeeming? So remember, as we talked about the idea of redeeming property or freeing somebody who'd fallen into servitude because of lack of means or falling into debt, we talked about the fact that the Old Testament law gives the ability for any near relative to come in and to redeem that land or that person. So there's an element there of care, an element of family, an element of togetherness, and there's even an implied obligation to do it. So if you're there and your brother has fallen into hard times and lost his land, it's not given as a command, but by implication as that person being part of your family, you've got the right to redeem that land, you've got the ability to redeem it. For your family, for your brother, for the entire family unit, the obligation would be there to go in and to buy that land back because it belongs to the family. There's not only the requirement that the person sell it back, but there's this implied requirement that you go in and do it. And because of that close familial obligation, the care that's involved there, because you want the assets that have been given by God to the family to remain in the family, you don't want your brother to become a slave, a servant to other people until the next Jubilee, you go in there and you redeem it. You exercise that care for others. Turn with me, if you will, to Romans 5, verses 6 through 11.

This same care, as we already recognize, was shown by Jesus Christ for all of us as He gave His life to redeem us. Romans 5, and we'll start in verse 6.

Romans 5, verse 6.

So this shows the level of care and concern, right? Talking about the fact that Jesus Christ is saved by His blood, we will be saved from wrath through Him. So this shows the level of care and concern, right? Talking about the fact that Jesus Christ laid His life down as a ransom for sin, long before He knew us, while we were still in our sins, He did that, reaching out ahead of time, showing that love, viewing humanity, the humans who would live as a part of His family, and wanting to put Himself out and pay that price. And the certainty comes back in here as well. Just like in the Old Testament, if you went to somebody who'd taken land, and you came and said, I am a near kin, I'm going to redeem this land, there was only one possible answer, and that was yes. And making sure that you were relative, making sure you paid the right amount. Same certainty here. There's not a question about whether Jesus Christ's blood can apply to our sins, is there? It is certain, and it's stated here in these verses, the fact that Christ died for us, and through that, we are cleansed from our sins.

We don't sometimes believe it ourselves. It's hard as we look at our lives, we go through the faults and the struggles that we deal with. But there is certainty that His blood can take away our sins. And so, just like in the Old Testament, redemption, in the New Testament, Jesus Christ's blood was given as a ransom for us.

Let's turn further to Philippians 2, verses 1-4. Philippians 2, verses 1-4. Again, focusing now on the care that's involved in this act of redeeming. Philippians 2, verses 1-4. And it comes through very strongly in how we read about Jesus Christ, and then by extension, the care that we should be showing to other people. This is a passage I always like to read through before the Passover. It's not kind of on our regular hit list of scriptures that we read, but I think it just exemplifies the heart and the core of what it is that we should be thinking about going into the Passover. Philippians 2, starting in verse 1.

Now, I'd like to pause on this for a minute as we think about this familial obligation to redeem that we see looking in the Old Testament law. As we connect that through to ourselves as we sit here, we talk about the fact that at the time of Passover, we take the bread, we take the wine. And what do we signify during that ceremony with those symbols? We signify the fact that we are one body through Jesus Christ. And to me, that's something sobering. It's something that always goes through my mind as I sit there in the Passover service. And we look around the room. We say, these are our brothers and sisters. These are my aunts and uncles. These are my fathers, my mothers, my grandmothers, my grandfathers. And it impresses on us the fact that we are one body. We are one in Jesus Christ. We are one family. And as a result, we have the obligation to redeem each other. One of the things that we've historically thought about as we go into the Passover time period is thinking about, you know, what separates us from our brothers and sisters? Are there conflicts that we have? Are there differences of opinion? Do we think that there's somebody in the congregation, a close brother or sister, that has something against us? And we try to settle those things in humility, going to our brother, and making sure that we reconcile these differences. Because we should not consider anybody who's sitting here as a brother and sister in Christ as irredeemable. We should be having the same attitude that we see in the Old Testament, that obligation to redeem when something's been taken from your family, and exercise that same attitude towards each other within the body of Christ. Being willing to lay our lives down as Jesus Christ laid his life down for us. Being ready to make ourselves vulnerable and weak in order to close those gaps and build those close relationships that we need to have with one another. Restoring and repairing any breaks that exist in those relationships. So that's the second element here of redemption. That exercise, that care that goes with it. It's not just a cold transaction. Okay, land's gone, pay money, all done. There's that close familial emotional element that goes along with it. That care that's involved. Let's look at the third element as we get towards the end of the message of redemption in terms of what it means for us. And the way I've posed it is redeemed to and redeemed from. Redeemed to and redeemed from. So we think of the Old Testament context again. There's a clear difference in standing before and after the act of redemption. The most extreme that I talked about was this idea of debt servitude. Right? What's it like before the redemption? A person's life is not their own. They're living at somebody else's direction. Nothing of their own. No asset. No means of freedom or anything. After the redemption, they've been freed. They're again their own person. They're at liberty. And they're ready to move forward. There's something that they're redeemed from, but there's also something they're redeemed to because they now need to go forward and live their lives. That, as I'm sure you're already thinking, has a lot of applicability to our lives as Christians. Let's look at Romans 6 as one example of this.

Romans 6, verses 15 through 19. We think of being redeemed from and being redeemed to. Romans 6, and we'll start in verse 15.

Paul writes in Romans 6, 15, But God be thanked that though you were slaves of sin, yet you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered. And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness. I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves of uncleanness and of lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves of righteousness for holiness. So this is making it very clear, in fact, even using the terms of slavery, that before we were slaves to sin, we didn't know. We didn't have God's way of life. We muddled along in life, and we did what we did because that's what we did. And now we're called to a very different life, not to keep living the old patterns that we did, but to live according to God's way of life. Something that we were redeemed to, where we were redeemed from that old sinless way of life, a way of not really thinking even about what we're doing or why we're doing it in many cases, to a way of life where we base everything that we do on God's way of life, knowing that there was a price by which we were redeemed, and so we need to live our lives differently because of that. I think we've all heard the old example of circus elephants.

You see circus elephants, I guess you don't see them anymore because circuses don't exist anymore, at least not in the U.S. But when they did, you'd see these monstrous elephants inside this circus tent. I can remember when we lived in Colorado, about a mile from our house, there was a vacant field, and one weekend the circus came to town. We went to see it. It was fun. A huge big top there. They had tigers. They had the elephants there. They were monstrous. The shoulders of the elephant higher than your head. And the elephant never went anywhere.

Why do circus elephants never go anywhere? They have this loose rope around their neck, and sometimes the end of that rope is tied to a little peg. We're talking a tent peg about this big, this tall, and maybe an inch in diameter. Now this elephant could easily just shrug its shoulders and rip that tent peg out of the ground. And in some cases, they don't even bother to tie the rope down.

Why is that? Well, when elephants are very young, they'll tie the rope around it, and they'll put it on a peg, and the elephant will try to get away. But the way an elephant is, after a short period of time, it realizes it can't get away because it's tied down by the rope. And for whatever reason, the way the elephant's brain works, it associates that rope around the neck with the fact that it's tied down. So by the time that elephant is fairly young already, you don't need to do more than put a rope around its neck, and it won't move, because it thinks it's tied down.

It might be free. At most, it's got this tiny tent peg that's hammered into the ground, but it won't go anywhere. Now how's that work in our lives? You know, to me, it's a really powerful metaphor when we think about being redeemed from and being redeemed to.

Because God comes in, He rips that tent peg out of the ground. He takes the rope off of our necks. But the fact is, the way we are as human beings, we still feel that rope, don't we? Whatever it might be, temptations that come along, horrible habits that we have, maybe ways that we grew up where we associate when brother or sister or coworker does A, I must do B because there's danger to me. There's so many different ways that that rope, we feel that rope around our neck, don't we?

And we act as though we're still enslaved, even though we've been freed through the blood of Jesus Christ. That's something we need to reflect on as we go through this time before the Passover. What are the ways that we figuratively feel that rope around our neck and act as though we're still enslaved, the old ways that we thought? And we need to reflect on that and think about it and take that apart, bring it before God so that we can understand how we can be redeemed from that, which we already have been, but be redeemed to a new way of life, a new way of acting when those pressures or those temptations or things come on us.

And doing it in the way that our elder brother would. Let's turn to one other passage in this regard. Ephesians 2. Ephesians 2 verses 8 through 10. Thinking about being redeemed to and being redeemed from. Ephesians 2 verses 8 through 10. In verse 8, Paul writing to the Ephesians, he says, So we think in terms of what are we redeemed to. It's clearly laid out here that as God's workmanship in Jesus Christ, our Redeemer, we are created for good works.

We've been redeemed for a purpose, and that purpose is to live God's way of life and to live it in a way that comes through in the actions that we do. Now there's a controversy that always swirls through Christian circles of grace versus works and how does all of this work, right? And again, I think this example of redemption is actually a great way to understand grace versus works as well. Because when you think about it, if you're a farmer and you've ended up falling into debt servitude, you're working.

But you're not working for yourself. You're working for someone else. And everything that you do goes somewhere else. All the crops that you grow, the animals that you help to tend, all of that goes to the owner. It doesn't go to you yourself. And the only way you can be redeemed from that, so that you can actually benefit from and do something with your hands and with your labor that will come back to yourself, is by being freed, by being redeemed.

And if you're in that situation, you're doing the same type of labor on both ends, before and after you're redeemed. The only way you can be redeemed, though, is by somebody coming in as a redeemer and paying that price, which is exactly what Jesus Christ did. And so we think about the things that we do, as people who have been redeemed from something, we recognize the fact that the only worth that we have, the only freedom that we have, is because there's a redeemer that came and freed us and set us on a new path, so that we can do these good works that we were prepared for.

It's only by His power that we can do that, and that we can be free to do it. And so we are redeemed, not only from something, from our past, but redeemed to something, in order to do good works and to show God's love and His care for other people and everything that we do. So in conclusion, we have been redeemed in every sense of the word. We think back to the Old Testament and the words we looked at. We know that a payment has been made in substitution for our lives.

We've been delivered out of bondage due to that redemption, and our wrongs have been atoned for. As we approach the Passover, I hope that this idea of redemption, thinking a little more in detail about this one word, what it means and how it operates in our Christian lives, will help us to be grateful for the fact that we've been redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ, and also help us to rededicate ourselves to living a new life through Him, not returning to our former state, but continuing to grow and develop in Him.