A RANSOM FOR MANY

JESUS says he came 'to give his life a ransom for many' (Mt. 20:28). This is one of those figures of speech with which the Lord's discourse on earth abounded. It is based upon the custom of demanding a price for the release of captives. To construe the words on the basis of this literal fact is to destroy the doctrine of which it is a figurative expression.There is no literal tyrant anywhere holding the human race in bondage, who will be satisfied with the payment of any ransom to let them go. Literally, it is God Who holds men in death because of disobedience. He Himself proposed their release; and Jesus is the illustration of the way of His wisdom in the matter. He sent him forth in the nature of the condemned, that sin might be condemned in him. Hence he 'MADE SIN' (2 Cr. 5:21), and when he died, 'he died unto sin* (Rm.6:lO), and when he comes again, he comes "without siny (Heb.ii:28). Regarding Sin in a figure as the captor of the human race, the death of Christ is in the same figure, a ransom. But it is a ransom in harmony with the revealed principle of action in the case, namely, the death of a sinless wearer of the condemned nature, and not a ransom in the ordinary sense. For this 'ransom' was only made effective for the deliverance of the captives by that resurrection to life again which his sinlessness allowed. Every element of Truth can be packed in the same box. In a wrong treatment of any truth, all the parts won't pack, of which we have illustration in many orthodox cases.
-September, 1873