Embark on a journey into the heart of Advent's most profound theme: love and its atoning power. Today's conversation, enriched by Matthew's daughter, Abby's, insights, shines a spotlight on the often overlooked yet crucial concept of propitiation from 1 John 4:10. Together, we navigate the complexities of this theological term and its implications on divine wrath and Jesus Christ's ultimate sacrifice. We confront the stark reality of sin and the uncompromising nature of God's justice, pondering the immensity of a love so great it bridges the chasm of our estrangement from the divine. The episode comes to life as we draw poignant parallels with the life of baseball legend Ty Cobb, whose story of transformation exemplifies the redemptive power of love.
Hello and welcome back once again to Real Life Community Church's Real Friends podcast Colin. The Advent series. We are on our here's a fancy word for you penultimate episode, the second to last one, and we are continuing with the fourth and final theme of Advent, which is love. Yes, and who doesn't love?
Speaker 2:
love everybody loves love, everybody loves love.
Speaker 1:
So, to that end, we're going to first start out with a bible verse about love, and we're going to be talking about an atoning facet of love. Abby, my daughter, is with us. Would you like to read first John, chapter 4, verse 10, and if you need to explain anything, feel free. In this love, not that we have loved God, but that he has loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. Also, in case you don't know what propitiation means, it means to appease.
Speaker 2:
Wow, thank you, abby man. I was sweating bullets over here.
Speaker 1:
And we were going to be in trouble with that. A little bit of help, but that's a five dollar theological word right there, isn't it?
Speaker 2:
So in the Roman world, particularly in Greek mythology, that word propitiation was used to describe appeasing, you know, a God's wrath, so to speak. So, for instance, you know, the gods were thought to be easily angered. They were very temperamental, impetuous, it seems.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, they might. If there was a drought over the land, you might have thought that there was a god of rain. That was, that's right.
Speaker 2:
So what you would do? You think, man, we've done something to displace the gods and we need rain. So they would sacrifice things and do dances and all kinds of crazy things to try. And then you know, if rain came, they're like oh well, propitiation has happened.
Speaker 1:
Yes, but far more often. I'm going to guess it did not work, that's right.
Speaker 2:
So you know, just to maybe give an everyday example, like if my wife and I have moments of intense Christian fellowship, she might get really mad at me, and so I've got to find a way to make propitiation, and that is done with an L8 and Gripos.
Speaker 1:
I was going to say flowers, but that's the Kentucky version of flowers?
Speaker 2:
Yeah, she'd much rather have the L8 and Gripos. So why is it necessary, then, for propitiation to be made for our sins Like? Why is this word used in the Bible? Why does God not just forgive everybody's sin, like God?
Speaker 1:
Because of one of the key facets of God, and this is the reason we study the word. You know, we're very used to thinking in modern culture, with Christianity, about God being a buddy and a friend and being I guess the spiritual word would be very graceful, full of grace and full of forgiveness, and these are certainly attributes of God. But what else is God? God?
Speaker 2:
is just he is you know and I love where you're going there. One commentator, I remember, asked a similar question. He asked this why doesn't the state of Colorado just wave its magic wand and forgive James Holmes for murdering 12 people and wounding 58 others in a theater in Aurora in the summer of 2012? And we know the answer right. To do so would be a horrendous violation of justice.
Speaker 2:
And so if the Lord were to simply, you know, kind of, as it were, wave a wand and forgive our sins, it would be a violation of his justice, because the wages of sin is death, and so sin is so atrocious. I don't think we necessarily understand it.
Speaker 1:
It's trivialized. Just think about what is one of the things that people describe as absolutely sinful Desserts Desserts, you know that is Now. You could be gluttonous and be sinful by, like, if I ate the whole chocolate cake tonight at the Wednesday service instead of just having a slice. I think that that would move into the realm of sinful potentially, but really what I mean there is not sinful, or anybody uses that phrase. Something is, you know, positively sinful or sinfully delicious, not really what we're referring to here.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, you know, I think we can feel the weight of sin when we look to the cross, because sin is so atrocious that it actually led to the crucifixion of our Lord. All sin is an affront against the holiness and the character of our holy God, and so sin violates the law of God, and again, it's punishable by death. So when Jesus took on flesh and he walked the earth, he did so without sin as we know, he was not guilty, but yet, in great love, there it is. He died a sinner's death, and here's the beautiful thing, with this idea of propitiation In his death, he became our substitute, and in that moment he appeased the wrath of God. In other words, justice was served, and so we can do nothing, nothing to appease the Lord for our own sins. Jesus again did for us what we could not do for ourselves, and so, for those who receive the free gift of salvation through Christ, we have this atonement, because Jesus has made propitiation, our sins have been covered and our debts have been paid. We are now reconciled to God.
Speaker 1:
Wow, the best Christmas gift we could ever ask yeah, wrap it up, I'll take it, as the Thunderbirds would have said.
Speaker 2:
There's a well known. This isn't very Christmassy story but for you sports fans you might enjoy this. But the well known, ty Cobb, was a fantastic baseball player, but he was said to be a rather deplorable human being. Have you heard this?
Speaker 1:
That's a strong word, but a fair word yes.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, he was known to humiliate and even purposely injure other players in his quest to win at all cost. And there are other allegations as well. And since there are allegations, I won't mention them. But the story doesn't end there, Thank goodness there's an author, David Allen, and here's what he writes about the story of Ty Cobb, Quote not long before he died, Cobb was visited by a Presbyterian minister named John Richardson.
Speaker 2:
Cobb curtly told the preacher to leave. Two days later he returned and this time Cobb listened as Richardson explained to him the plan of salvation. Hearing of Christ's love for sinners and how he had come to die for the likes of Ty Cobb, the Georgia peach was overcome with the emotion. Richardson continued to explain the necessity of repentance towards sin and faith in Jesus as the only way of salvation, and Cobb told the preacher he was ready to put his complete trust in Jesus Christ as his savior. Two days before he died, Ty Cobb told Richardson quote I feel the strong arms of God underneath me. End quote. Ty Cobb, through faith in Christ, found atonement and he experienced the manifest love of God in Jesus.
Speaker 1:
So, as we try to tie this into the all of our collective quest, who are doing and listening to this podcast, you know have Christ at the forefront instead of getting distracted this holiday season by everything else. I think one of the great things about Ty Cobb and finding the atonement that Jesus did for him, what did it take? Did it take a lot of debate? Did it take a lot of other you know worldly examples? Did it take a lot of people coming to him? No, Took one person and all it took was the word being spoken, hearing the word. That is where faith comes from. So this Christmas season you're feeling distracted. You want to have it at the forefront. You don't have to do anything fancy. Get out your Bible, Don't worry about any place else to turn to for this particular thing. Just go to the Christmas story. All you have to do read it out loud, hear it and let your family hear it, and I think that you'll be blessed this holiday season.
Speaker 2:
That's right, and tomorrow is Christmas Eve and we will be back for our final episode. Make sure to tune in.