NAMES AND TITLES OF CHRIST
THE LAMB OF GOD
DR. JIM DIXON
JOHN 1:29-37
JULY 20, 1997
Four months ago, in March of 1997, biologists at the Roslyn Institute in Scotland stunned the world with an announcement that they had cloned a mammal. They had created a little lamb by cloning a single cell from an adult sheep named Dolly. Of course, this has created much controversy, many ethical questions regarding the science of genetics. There have been many articles in newspapers, magazines and periodicals throughout the world regarding cloning of late. Time Magazine has said that this clone, this little lamb cloned in Scotland, is destined to become the most famous lamb in the history of the world. That is probably true physically speaking but figuratively speaking there is a lamb more famous, a lamb whose birth, who’s coming into this world was even more unusual and more miraculous, a lamb the Bible calls the “Lamb of God.”
This morning as we examine the titles of Christ, we look at this great title, the “Lamb of God.” Two times in the gospel of John, Jesus is called the “Lamb of God.” Twice the Apostle Paul in his epistles refers to Jesus Christ as the “Lamb of God” and 28 times in the book of Revelation in the Apocalypse Jesus Christ is given this title, the “Lamb of God.” This title has three meanings, the third of which really relates to the title, the “Lion of Judah” and we will examine it next week. So, this week we will take a look at the first two meanings of the title, the “Lamb of God.”
First of all, this title refers to the Passover Lamb. It refers to the Paschal Lamb. When we think of Jesus Christ as the “Lamb of God,” we must think of the Passover Lamb. I think most of you know the story of the Passover as described in the book of Exodus in the Old Testament, in chapters 11 and 12. You know how Moses was sent by the will of God and by the anointing of God before the Pharaoh of all Egypt and Moses said, “Let my people go.”
Many historians believe that the Pharaoh that Moses approached was actually Ramses II. Perhaps the greatest builder of all the pharaohs of Egypt, it was Ramses II who built the Temple of Amman rah at Karnak. It was Ramses II who built a new royal city in the Nile delta. It was Ramses II who built the temples of Abu Simbel, and those temples are on the Nile River in southern Egypt. The great temple there, Ramses II dug 200 feet into the mountain cliffs to make that great temple. Outside that great temple are four large statues, each 67 feet high, each statue the image of Ramses II himself. He was a man swollen with conceit. He was a pharaoh who lived for the manifestation of his own glory, and he was stubborn, and he was proud.
Now, perhaps he wasn’t the pharaoh Moses approached but it doesn’t matter because whoever the pharaoh was, he was just like Ramses II, a man swollen with conceit, proud and stubborn. If you’ve read Exodus 7,8,9 and 10, you know that nine times Moses said, “Let my people go.” Nine times God brought plagues upon Egypt as warnings. Each time the pharaoh ignored the warnings and so there came the tenth plague. The tenth plague, you recall, was death—death to the firstborn. The children of Israel were spared from that death and from the power of the angel of death by the Lamb of God, by the Passover Lamb, by the Paschal Lamb, by the blood of the lamb.
You recall how the children of Israel took the blood of the Passover Lamb and they placed that blood on the doorpost or the lintel of their houses and the angel of death passed over and they were spared, and they were given life. There is not a Bible scholar who doubts that when Jesus Christ is called the Lamb of God, this is part of the meaning. Jesus is the Passover Lamb. He is the Paschal Lamb. By His blood, by His death, we are saved from death. The Bible says, “Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise partook of the same nature that by His death He might destroy him who has the power of death, that is the devil, and deliver those who through fear of death are subject to lifelong bondage.” You see, there are some people in this world subject to lifelong bondage through fear of death. Christ doesn’t want you to be afraid of death. He is the Lamb of God, the Passover Lamb.
Now, I know that most of you have heard of Victoria who was Queen of England. She was Queen of Ireland. She was Queen of Scotland. She was Empress of India. She ruled the British Empire for 63 years, longer than any other British sovereign. The Victorian era draws its name from her name. England rose to the zenith of its power during her reign. She married Prince Albert and by royal standards, their marriage was a great marriage. They both loved each other. They had nine children, four boys and five girls. The people loved Victoria and the people loved Albert because he was generous, and he was philanthropic, but nobody loved Albert more than Victoria.
The problem was in the year 1861, Albert died, and Victoria was left alone in her grief, and she never got over it. She lived another 40 years, but she never ceased to grieve for her loss of Albert. Every night for those 40 years, year after year, night after night, she took a picture of Albert to bed with her. She wore black for so many years that the people of England referred to her as the Widow of Windsor.
Windsor was not her only royal residence. There was Kensington Palace where Victoria was born and there was Buckingham Palace from which she ruled. There was Balmoral Palace, Balmoral Castle in Scotland, which was her summer retreat. Then most mysterious of all, on the Isle of Wight, there was Osborne House. Osborne House was her winter retreat but in her later years, she lived at Osborne House year-round. At that great mansion there was a great staircase and the great staircase wound around to the top where there was a room at the top of Osborne House. It was a room into which only Victoria went. No one else had the key. No one else was ever allowed to go in there and everybody wondered what was in that room.
In the year 1901, Queen Victoria died. Her eldest son, Edward, who became Edward VII ascended the throne. One of the first things that Edward did was to travel to the Island of Wight. There he went to the Osborne House, and he had the key. He went up that great staircase to that room at the top of the mansion. He opened the door, and he was stunned to see nothing but photographs of corpses, pictures of dead people, all over the walls and stacked in piles on the floor. Pictures of corpses, all of the loved ones and family members that had been known to the royal family. All of their photographs were there. Historians believe that Victoria had some kind of preoccupation with death. Most historians believe that despite her public confession of Christ and her genuine Christianity, she still had a fear of death.
Perhaps some of you are like that. I mean perhaps, not that you would have a morbid curiosity about death, but maybe you have a fear of death despite your Christian faith. There are many people in this world of course who fear death and tragically many Christians who fear death. Christ doesn’t want us to live day by day with any fear of death.
There’s a magazine that just came out, Newsweek Magazine just came out with this cover story, “How to Live to 100.” There are many different articles in conjunction with this theme but there’s also a test in here you can take that is designed to tell you how long you’ll live. I took the test. I mean there’s a health segment dealing with total cholesterol, HDL, LDL and all that stuff. Then there is a lifestyle segment with questions relating to whether you drink and whether you smoke, questions relating to diet. Then there’s a family segment relating to whether you’re single or married, whether your mother and father are still alive, how long your grandparents lived.
I took the test and according to the test, I am going to live to be 76 years of age. I’ll die in the year 2021. So, should I make plans? Certainly not. Certainly not because it’s only a statistical average and of course it’s based on the best knowledge of contemporary science but even scientists today will acknowledge that their best knowledge is woefully inadequate. Truth be known, I might die in 1997 or I might live to be 100 but have you ever wondered why it is so many people want to live to be 100? I mean if heaven is real, and if heaven is really infinitely better than anything on this earth, why are so many people so desperate to stretch out the years on earth? There’s nothing wrong with longevity and there’s something right about taking care of ourselves, but why are so many people, even so many Christians, so preoccupied with health and so trying to stretch out the years if they really believe in heaven—I mean really believe that this life is just a drop in the bucket and there is just a sea of glorious eternity beyond death if we really believe in Christ and the promises of Christ.
You know, in the USA Today newspaper, there’s a little snapshot section called “Statistics Which Shape Our Lives.” Just this last week there was a statistic relating to heaven, and according to the USA Today, 67% of the people of America are certain that there is a heaven—67% of the people of America are certain that there is a heaven. Incredibly, 88% of the people of America are certain that they’re going to heaven. That creates a kind of cognitive dissonance. It doesn’t make a lot of sense. Apparently more people are confident that they’re going to heaven than there are people who believe that heaven exists. I think if the truth were known, I believe most people really are not confident that heaven exists and they’re not confident that they’re going there.
You see, the Apostle John wrote these words. “I write this to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you might know that you have eternal life. Jesus is the Lamb of God. He is the Passover Lamb. He delivers us from death, and He wants us to live every single day of our lives with that confidence.” The Apostle Paul said, “For me to live is Christ and to die is gain.” Philippians 1:21. He said, “My desire is to depart and to be with the Lord.” Philippians 1:23. He didn’t say that because he had a suicide wish. He said that because he simply knew heaven is better,
In the book of Romans in the 8th chapter, the Apostle Paul wrote, “I am convinced that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor things present nor things to come nor heights nor depths nor powers nor anything else in all of creation can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” He is the Lamb of God, the Passover Lamb who delivers us from death.
But there is a second meaning, and the second meaning concerns the Temple Lamb. In saying that Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God, we’re saying not only that He is the Passover Lamb, but we’re also saying that He is the Temple Lamb. In the book of Exodus, the 29th chapter, in verses 28 through 32, we are told how in the Jerusalem Temple, every single morning and every single evening, a lamb was offered in sacrifice for the sin of the people.
The daily sacrifice of the temple lamb continued as long as the temple stood. In times of war, in times of siege, the offering did not cease. The sacrifice continued day after day, morning and evening, the temple lambs sacrificed for the sin of the people. The offerings continued until 70AD when Titus and his Roman legions swept over the city of Jerusalem and leveled the temple. But the truth is, those sacrifices should have ceased around the year 30AD when Jesus Christ was crucified, sacrificed, on Calvary. That’s when the sacrifices of the temple lamb should have ceased because Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God who was sacrificed once and for all for the sin of the world. He is the sacrifice for your sin and the sacrifice for my sin.
In the early 1960s, a man named Charles Watson who went by the name Tex Watson, went to southern California because he was searching for what he called total freedom. If, in the 1960s you were looking for total freedom, there was no place better to go than southern California. Tex Watson arrived there in the early 60s and he found his way to a ranch where he met a man whose name was Charles Manson. Tex Watson became part of what was called the Manson Family.
Charles Manson had a kind of satanic charm. With demonic power, he drew followers, and he ensnared them. Tex Watson became one of Charles Manson’s most faithful followers. In the subsequent years, Tex Watson absorbed vast quantities of pot and acid and Manson philosophy. “If you really want to be free,” Charles Manson told Tex Watson, “If you want to be totally free, then you must remove all that is human from within you and you must become like an animal because only animals,” Charles Manson said, “only animals are totally free. They have no rules. They have no boundaries. They have no scruples. They do what they want to do when they want to do it and if you want to be totally free, you must remove all that is human, and you must become an animal.” God only knows the number of demons that entered into Tex Watson in those years as he followed Charles Manson, but it all led to 1969 and the Tate-LaBianca bloodbath when, as most of you know, seven human beings were butchered.
Tex Watson and other members of the Manson Family were convicted of murder. A psychologist determined that Tex Watson was totally insane which he was. He was incarcerated in L.A. County, placed in a cell with iron bars and he began to just throw himself against those bars, shredded his own body day after day. The months and the years passed, and Tex Watson was moved from facility to facility, so violent they had to chain him to his bed. Those who guarded him at the prisons and those who saw him said that it seemed like there was nothing human left in him. He truly had become an animal.
Today Tex Watson remains incarcerated and he will be incarcerated for the rest of his life but he is not the same. He is not the same because somebody put a Bible in his cell and Tex Watson began to read that Bible. He had felt no remorse. He had felt no guilt about the life he had lived, about the people he had butchered. No remorse. No guilt. But suddenly as he read the Bible, the power of the Holy Spirit penetrated to his dead soul and began to quicken him. He began to see the horror of his sin and of his depravity and he began to weep. Those who watched him and guarded him said that he wept for days, crying out for the mercy of God and begging Jesus Christ to forgive him and to wash him whiter than snow. Incredibly, incomprehensibly, Jesus Christ did just that, washed him whiter than snow, because He is the Lamb of God.
Today, Tex Watson leads a Bible study group in maximum security at the prison where he is incarcerated. Those who know him and observe him say that they have rarely seen a human being with greater compassion and love. Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
I don’t know what sin is in your life, but I know it’s not too great for Christ because He is the Temple Lamb. He is the Final Sacrifice, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Maybe you’re sitting there thinking, “Well, I’m not sure I really need that lamb because I’m not like Tex Watson. I’m no animal. I’m very human.” Maybe you’re thinking, “I’m pretty good. I’m basically good.”
A few weeks ago as Barb and I were on vacation, we went up to the mountains. I was taking a walk around Keystone Lake in Summit County. On Keystone Lake, there’s a little business there where they rent bicycles and they also rent canoes and kayaks and pedal boats. There’s a little pier, a little dock there on the lake. I was about 300 yards away, walking towards that pier, and there was a little girl there on the pier holding her mother’s hand. The little girl couldn’t have been more than 2 or 3 years old. Her mother let go of her hand for a second to talk to the person next to her and suddenly this little girl just fell into the lake with no clue how to swim.
There was a young man there and I don’t know, he looked like college age. He worked at that rental place. Fully clothed with shoes on and everything, he did not hesitate. Just like a streak, he just darting into the water, and he had that little girl in an instant. He lifted her out and put her up on the dock. Her mother who was in shock was so grateful.
Somehow as I watched that, as I was moving towards the pier, I was just kind of stunned for a second. I was deeply moved by it. I mean this young man… I mean he didn’t think for a second about what he was wearing or the fact that he was fully dressed or that he had these heavy shoes on. He didn’t think about himself at all. There was something good in him.
I remember when I was in graduate school in seminary. I had a professor named Dr. Daniel Fuller who was a hyper-Calvinist. He had an extreme view of what theologians call total depravity. Dr. Daniel Fuller believed that every human being on the face of the planet was totally depraved in the fullest sense with no goodness in them. The image of God totally eradicated in human beings. He believed that apart from the regenerate power of Christ, there is nothing good in any human being. He believed that everyone was always motivated by self and apart from the indwelling presence of Christ, there was no selfless act. He would have said that that young man jumped into the lake not because there was some goodness in him, but because perhaps he wanted a reward or perhaps he was afraid of losing his job or he just didn’t want to deal with the subsequent guilt if he had done nothing, but he would have said he didn’t do it out of goodness.
I don’t believe that. I don’t believe the image of God is totally eradicated in human beings in this world. It is residual, broken, yes, but residual. There’s some goodness in every single human being and there’s also some evil in each of us. There is sin in each of us. How does God judge that? How does God weigh that? Does God have a ledger where He records the good and the evil? The good things we do and the sinful things we do? How’s it going to work with this young man? I mean because he jumped into the lake and did a good thing, can he go smoke a few joints, buy a couple of porno magazines? Can he go back to school and cheat on his exams? Can he slander a few enemies and God just look the other way because he jumped into the lake and rescued a little girl? Is that how it works? Does God keep a ledger like that?
The Bible says absolutely not! God isn’t keeping a ledger like that. Your good deeds cannot cancel out your sin, cannot do it, because when we’re good, that’s simply the image of God in us. That’s how we were created to be. There’s no plus side of the ledger. There’s only the minus side and the minus side is the sin we commit, and the list is long for all of us. Maybe not like Tex Watson. There are no murderers in this room. But the list is long, and we are in desperate need of a Savior. I am in desperate need of a Savior. You are in desperate need of a Savior. Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Apart from Him, we’re in a whole lot of trouble. Only Christ can redeem us. He is the Temple Sacrifice. He is the one who has atoned for sin.
Perhaps you’re thinking as a Christian, “Well, what about sins I’ve committed after accepting Christ?” Of course, if you’re a Calvinist you believe that you can never lose your salvation no matter how many sins you commit as a Christian. If you’re an Armenian, you believe that you could commit sins so great that perhaps you could lose your salvation. Both of them have Bible passages they use. Personally, I tend to be Calvinistic at that point, and I believe once you’re truly saved, you can’t lose that salvation.
The Bible does teach that when you accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior and you receive Him as the Lamb of God, your sin is forgiven you past, present and future. But God warns us, doesn’t He, about perverting grace to license, about spurning the blood of the covenant by which we’ve been saved. God does warn us. If in you there is a continuing sin that is known and ignored, practiced without repentance, beware because even as a Christian, there will be consequences in this life because you’ve left the commandments of God and you’re dancing with the devil. And there will be consequences in the life to come at the Bema Seat, at the Judgement Seat of Christ when you will suffer loss of reward. I would not be faithful as a servant of Christ if I did not tell you this.
But we rejoice in this, do we not? We rejoice in this that by His death, we have found life, and no one can take that life away. We rejoice in the fact that He is the Lamb of God. He is the Passover Lamb who has conquered death and we need not fear it. He is the Temple Lamb, the final offering for sin, and we need not live in guilt if we’ve received Christ as Lord and Savior and we confess our sins daily, seeking to walk with Jesus. Let’s look to the Lord with a word of prayer.