How to Enjoy Jesus Christ as Your Propitiation

God’s complete salvation is incredibly rich! It’s like a beautiful, multifaceted diamond. Propitiation is one of the marvelous facets of the diamond of God’s complete salvation.

It is that particular aspect of salvation that shows how Christ took away man’s sin to appease the relationship between man and God.

Let’s consider three shining aspects of propitiation in God’s salvation and how we can experience and enjoy Christ in each aspect.

 What is propitiation and why do we need it?

 Before we can appreciate the three aspects of propitiation, we first need to understand what propitiation means.

To “propitiate” simply means to appease or make favorably inclined, to conciliate a relationship. In the Bible, it’s to appease the relationship between us and God.

Since God is absolutely righteous and we became sinners, we need God’s provision of propitiation (Rom. 3:22-23). The disobedience of our forefather Adam brought sin to all mankind (Rom. 5:12, 19). But not only do we have a record of sin, we also have a huge problem that alienates us from God (Col. 1:21).

First, Christ is the unique sacrifice for our propitiation; we need to believe in Him and praise Him for Who He is—1 John 2:2.

From the time sin entered into the world, God determined that His only Son, Jesus Christ would become the unique sacrifice for propitiation. As such a One He satisfies all God’s righteous demands on us, appeasing the relationship between us and God.

Since Jesus, God’s Son, is both the complete God and the perfect, sinless man, He is the One uniquely qualified to deal with the problem separating us and God (1 John 1:7).

As a man, Jesus is the only One with sinless human blood that could be shed for our sins. As God’s Son, He is also the only One with eternal deity, making His propitiation effective in covering the full span of sin—past, present and future.  Our Lord Jesus is the propitiation for “the sins of the whole world”!

First John 2:2 says,

“And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for those of the whole world.”

Since Christ is the unique sacrifice for our propitiation we should simply believe in Who He is and praise Him by saying,

 Lord Jesus, I believe in You as the One Who is both the complete God and a perfect man. You as the eternal, divine One shared in our blood and flesh in order to become God’s appointed sacrifice for our propitiation. Praise you for laying aside Your glory to become a lowly man, the Lamb of God, to remove the problem of sin between us and God!

Second, Jesus Christ made propitiation for our sins; we need to receive it by faith and thank Him for what He has done—Heb. 2:17.

Jesus Christ is not only the sacrifice for our propitiation—the uniquely qualified One. He is also the One who voluntarily took the action needed to make propitiation for us on the cross.

By His death, Jesus fully satisfied all God’s righteous demands, appeasing our relationship with God. In this way, God can be peacefully gracious to us.

Heb. 2:17 says,

“Hence He should have been made like His brothers in all things that He might become a merciful and faithful High Priest in the things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.”

We could never pay the supreme price required by God. But Christ made a full propitiation for us on the cross. He  shed His sinless blood to take away all our sins. Now we only need to receive by faith all He has accomplished in dying for us.

We can do this by simply thanking the Lord,

Lord, thank you for dying for me! I receive by faith all that You have done in dying on the cross for me. Thank you for making a full propitiation not only for me but for all the people of this world. Your death has fully satisfied all God’s righteous requirements removing the problem of separation between us and God!

Third, Christ is our place of propitiation; we can come forward to Him in our spirit and enjoy Him as our moment-by-moment supply—Rom. 3:25; Heb. 4:16.

Christ became the place where we, the fallen sinners, can meet with the righteous God without any contradiction to His righteousness. This place was depicted by the blood sprinkled cover of the Ark in the Old Testament tabernacle and temple  (Heb. 9:5). It was upon this cover, or lid, that God could meet with and be gracious to His people.

Now we can continually come forward to Christ as our propitiation place (also called “the throne of grace” in Heb. 4:16) by coming to Him in our spirit (2 Tim. 4:22). Whenever we turn to our spirit, we touch this “throne of grace” where we can have sweet fellowship with God, and receive His mercy and find His grace for our timely help.

Hebrews 4:16 says,

“Let us therefore come forward with boldness to the throne of grace that we may receive mercy and find grace for timely help.”

We can now continually come forward to Christ as our place of propitiation, our throne of grace and enjoy Him by saying,

 Dear Lord Jesus, praise you that You are now our propitiation place—the place where we can peacefully fellowship with God, enjoying His sweet presence and receiving His mercy and grace for timely help. Lord, we come forward to You boldly by Your blood to receive all that You are as our moment-by-moment supply.

 If you’ve enjoyed these three aspects on propitiation, I hope you’ll take a moment to leave a comment and then visit our Facebook page to continue the conversation.

References and Further Reading:

• This post is drawn from Bible verses and footnotes in the Holy Bible Recovery Version
• You may be able to get a free copy from Bibles for America (in the US).
• By studying all the referenced verses with the accompanying footnotes, you will be able gain a deeper grasp of this profound subject.
• You may also enjoy this related song.
• Photo Credit:  stevendepolo