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Nothing But the Blood
Episode #169
With Martha Kilpatrick and hosted by John Enslow
Special guests: Julie, Jennifer, and Joan
(Julie) This is a question. It seems like to me, I’m asking you if this is right. It seems like to me right now that if… so long as there is sin, or so long as I have sin, so long as I have a guilty conscience, I can be nothing else but a liar. Is that true? And since according to scripture there is no removal of sin except the Blood, period; and so if I guess that’s just what I see. It seems so simple to me in this moment. If as long as I… If I choose to keep my sin, or keep my guilty conscience, then I am… I condemn myself to go on as a liar, and a hider, and somebody who’s going to wear masks, because I can’t be without… There’s just no other alternative. And the only way for that to be removed is to come to the humility of absolutely bowing and receiving and trusting the Blood. Is that right?
(M) Hmhmm. Yeah, Julie, I think what it is, is if you don’t take the Blood, you’ve got to go back to self-effort. And to go to self-effort, you have to become a fake, because self-effort will never, will never do anything but delude you. The real transformation comes through the Life and the Blood of Jesus. And I think that that has been more of a foundation for me than I knew. I just simply did, believed it and moved that way, and lived that way. But I think it is the secret to being transformed and changed. If you’re cleansed from sin, you’re not the same person. And it makes it so much easier then to be simply transparent; just I am who I am. And there won’t be, there won’t ever be a day when we ‘arrive’. Everything is given to us, but we will, we have a journey to receive everything. And I don’t know, I think the Blood is, as Carole has said, the sap of the Vine. And it flows among us and between us. I have to extend the Blood. My forgiveness is extending the Blood to others; that Christ has paid for them. And until I forgive in the power of the Blood, I have not forgiven. I forgive, based on His payment for their sin against me. Does that make sense? My forgiveness includes the recognition of the Blood, though I don’t say it, that’s what I deeply know. That when I, when I really forgive, I am saying the Blood of Christ has forgiven you, and I agree with the Blood.
(Jennifer) What I’m hearing when your saying that is, what you value above all else is the Blood of Christ. And for me, the pride and arrogance that says the Blood isn’t enough, is a lovely telling of my lack of love, and my lack of value in the Blood of Christ. If I don’t believe it’s enough, if I believe in the doctrine of atonement, say, which is basically just self-effort, this idea that you can somehow through effort ‘take back’ what you did; make up for it. Then I don’t value the Blood of Christ, which means I don’t love Him. And it’s only if I love Him, that His death means anything to me, and that His sacrifice means anything to me, and that the Blood has any sway in my life whatsoever. Because you’re saying this, and I’m, I’m sitting here listening to you and this is a confession of my sin. I wasn’t connecting at first with what you were saying, because back in my head the little voice says, all right, but it can’t be that easy. And then I stopped. Because think of that phrase even, of me saying that, ‘easy’, when there was nothing easy about Gethsemane, the cross, the life that He lived. There’s nothing easy and simple about it. But I, I view the Blood as this idea that I’m getting off easy. Well, I might be, but there’s nothing easy about it, and there’s nothing simple about it. And that’s just me telling the world how little I value the sacrifice that He made, and how little I love His Life, and the Life of the Son. And I’m basically saying that, you know, I value my own effort more than the sacrifice that He made. And that’s only my lack of loving Him. That’s me loving me more than Him, period, that I could even say something like that.
(M) I wish I had the words of Oswald to that, Jennifer, because he writes in a way that says it cost the Son of God the agony, so that it would be easy for us. And we make it hard for us, and that is when we make ourselves god. But we… The humility to accept the gift of His agony is to fall in love with Him every time you take the… He says, “Do this in remembrance of Me.” And I used to wonder what that meant, but every time you are cleansed, you love Him more because of what it cost Him to make it easy for me. And that’s why the story of the woman who came in and washed His feet, Jesus said, to, I believe it was Simeon or Simon, “You didn’t even give Me water to wash My feet.” And, “She loves because she’s been forgiven much.” So I appreciate that.
(Joan) Ah, I realized as we were sitting here and sharing, one of the wonderful gifts that Martha has given me in my life, is she has so received my humanity. And that’s because, I see now it’s because of the Blood. The transparency that she’s always lived in and given to us as a gift, and allowed us to be fully human. And I honestly say to you all, fully human, ah, is because of the Blood. You cannot be transparent without the Blood. You will not receive your own humanity. You will hate it. You will kill it. You will cover it. Because without the Blood it’s impossible to be the human being that God created us to be, and believe it is good, and that He is enough. And I thank you for that transparency, because I see it’s not possible without the Blood.
(Joan) I’ve got a scripture for Julie. It’s Hebrews ten, talks about faith. Hebrews ten talks about the one offering, and all that we receive from the one offering of Christ on the cross. And verse 22 says, “Let us all come forward and draw near with true, honest, and sincere hearts, in unqualified assurance, and absolute conviction engendered by faith, by that leaning of the entire personality on God in absolute trust and confidence in His power, wisdom, and goodness. Having our hearts sprinkled and purified from a guilty, evil conscience, and our bodies cleansed with pure water.” And the Blood cleanses our evil conscience, the Blood. And all he asks for us is to say it, confess it, and, and there’s forgiveness and healing through the Blood.
(M) I do want to say, because we’re really ready to take communion, ah, that I see… I’ve been brooding on it all for a long time this morning, that the, the real reason we do anything, hate ourselves, or try to be something, or lie, or sin, is because we are desperately looking for love. We become ‘something else’ to be loved. Ah, we create a persona to be loved. And the first thing God does in our lives when we are saved is to bring us love in one form or another, so that we can personally experience that satisfaction to that terrible need to be loved ‘as I am’, and ‘known as I am’ and still loved. That’s the love we secretly want. And He intends when that comes into our lives, for us to grasp it. And on the foundation of that knowledge we’re loved, we can be transparent. Only if you’re, as Joan said, you’re accepted. But really only if you’re loved can you be transparent. And only when you know you’re loved can you face it. You can’t bear to face any of our wickedness until you know you’re loved. He doesn’t bring it to you. But if He ever brings it to you, then you’ve got to know you have no excuse, because you’ve been loved enough to be able to go through it. And if you reject the confrontation or the chastening, it’s because you have not received that first step. And He wants you to build on love so that all the rest of it is, is an increase of love. I was in Hosea this morning, and it wrung my heart out, what a broken hearted lover God is. ‘You didn’t love Me; I didn’t want sacrifice, I wanted love.’ And He pours out His love on us, and if we’re not good receivers of that simple love, we will not be transparent, and we will pile sin upon sin unnecessarily. The transparency comes from the confidence that you’re loved. It’s astonishing that we are, because I certainly don’t love myself, natively, and yet, when His love comes to us, we can let love, our neighbor as ourselves. So that’s … We’re going to take communion this morning together, and I… this morning I want us to ah… I think communion, the experience of communion should be living. And even though we could follow a certain prayer, and that’s wonderful, at times it’s living. And I want us to give the cup to each other, and the bread to each other, as we’ve done in small group settings. Presenting the cup, this is for you, Jacquelyn, the Blood that was shed for you for the remission of sins. And this bread is for you Julie, the Life and Flesh of the Lord Jesus Christ, given for you. And that makes it our mutual Table, which is what it’s supposed to be when we meet. So, we ask that, we ask corporately and together that this podcast be a blessing and a revelation of the Blood to the Body of Christ. And we ask the Holy Spirit to reveal the wonder and the amazement of the Blood to all of us. Amen.
