# The Lutheran Pioneer_St. Louis_1897_S9 # Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration) Che Lutheran Pioneer. A MISSIONARY MONTHLY. PusBLIsHED By THE EVANGELICAL LutaeraN SynopicaL ConFERENCE OF Norto AMERICA. R. A. BISCHOFF, Editor. Entered at the Post Office at St. Louis, Mo., as second-class matter. Vol. XIX. St. Louis, Mo., March, 1897. No. 3. Behold the Man. “Jesus, Saviour, Son of God, Bearer of the sinner’s load; Thou the sinner’s death hast died, Thou for us wast crucified; For our sins Thy flesh was torn, Thou the penalty hast borne Of our guilt upon the tree, Which the Father laid on Thee! Saviour, Surety, Lamb of God, Thou hast bought us with Thy blood; Thou hast wiped the debt away, Nothing left for us to pay; Nothing. left for us to bear, Nothing left for us to share, But the pardon and the bliss, But the loye, the light, the peace.” —— +> + oa oe + oe For Us. When we, in the season of Lent, go with Christ on His way of sorrows from Gethse- mane to Calvary and behold His bitter suffer- ings, His great agony, His shameful death upon the cross, we must remember that He suffered and died, not for Himself, but for us. There is no sin in Christ, and therefore the punishment He endured could not be His due. Pilate, the judge, said again and again, ‘‘I find no fault in Him.’’ Christ was ‘‘holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners,’’ Hebr. 7, 26. He ‘‘did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth,’’ 1 Pet. 2, 22. Of Him the Father said, ‘‘This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” And yet the Son of God, the Holy One, was punished and endured death, which is the Wages of sin. He was nailed to the tree of the cross, and it is written, ‘‘Cursed is every One that hangeth on a tree.’’? How is this? It Christ was without sin, why did He suffer the punishment of sin? He bore the.punish- Ment of our sins. He suffered and died for us. “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.’? There were no sins in Christ, but there were sins on Christ. He took the sins of the world Upon Himself; and the sin-hating God poured Upon His sin-bearing Son the wrath which we Sinners deserved. Thus Christ took our place and suffered and died for us. This the Bible plainly teaches. St. Paul says, ‘‘Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us, Gal. 3, 13. Again he says, God ‘‘hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him,’’ 2 Cor. 5, 21. Again he says, He “‘gave Himself for our sins,” Gal. 1, 4. The apostle Peter says of Christ: ‘‘His own self bare our sins in His body on the tree,”’ 1 Pet. 2,24. The prophet Isaiah, speaking of the suffering Saviour, writes: ‘‘All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all,” Tsa. 53, 6. From these and other passages of the Bible we learn that Christ suffered and died as our substitute, that is, in our stead, for us. What a horrible thing sin is! Men often make light of sin, but sin is a horrible thing. It is a great offense against the just and holy God. When God saw His Son laden with the sins of the world, He did not spare His be- loved Son, but punished Him for the sins He bore. What a horrible thing sin is! Our sins brought that great suffering of body and soul on the Holy One of God. Our sins made Him a man of sorrows, nailed Him to the cross, and put Him to death. What a horrible thing sin is! ; Blessed are they who thus acknowledge and feel their sins. In the suffering and dying Saviour they can find salvation. By His sufferings and death He redeemed us from everlasting sufferings and death in hell. In His death we find life, and ‘‘by His wounds we are healed.’’ His blood “cleanseth us from all sins,” and though our ‘sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.’ The moment the sinner accepts by faith the redemption procured by the sufferings and death of Christ and offered to him in the Gos- pel, he has forgiveness of sins and is free from all punishment of sin. For since Christ suffered and died for us, there is “‘now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus,” Rom. 8, 1. _ The Service of the Redeemed. By sin we have become the slaves of Satan, by faith in Christ we have forgiveness of sin and become the children of God. Being re- deemed from the slavery of Satan, the Chris- tian serves God, not asa slave, but as a child. His service is the service of a thankful heart. He serves God, not in order to be saved, but because he is saved. He confesses: ‘‘I be- lieve that Jesus Christ, true God, begotten of the Father from eternity, and also true man, born of the Virgin Mary, is my Lord, who has redeemed me, a lost and condemned creature, purchased and won me from all sins, from death and from the power of the devil, not with gold or silver, but with His holy precious blood and with His innocent sufferings and death, that I may be His own, and live under Him in His kingdom, and serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness.’’” It is said that just before the civil war, a wealthy gentleman, who was walking the streets of a southern city, had his attention called to a group of colored slayes about to be sold. One of them was weeping bitterly, and when he asked her why she was crying, she replied that she did not know what kind of master was going to buy her, nor where she was going. He said nothing more, but when she was placed upon the block for sale, he bid a higher price for her than any other did, and she was given him as his property. She was still weeping, until he gently said: “I have not bought you to make a slave of you, I have bought you to set you free.’’ She in- stantly turned to him with the glad cry: ‘‘Let me go with you, I will serve you all my life.”” But she served him, not in order to be re- deemed; she served him with a glad and happy heart, because she was redeemed. Thus the service of the redeemed of Christ is a service of love. It is the blessed service of a thankful heart. «Lord, [am Thine, for Thou hast purchased me; The price —Thy precious blood. A sinner, lost and ruined, found and saved Am I; and I am Thine, O God. My all is Thine, be this my one desire, ‘To serve Thee here below; And, by Thy Spirit daily taught, Thy will To love, and Thee Thyself to know.”