The price of redemption
Pause then to consider the significance of the price God paid in order to provide redemption for people like us:
…you were not redeemed with corruptible things, [like] silver or gold, from your aimless conduct [received] by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. (1 Peter 1:18-19)
…the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace... (Ephesians 1:6b, 7)
…the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins… (Colossians 1:13b, 14)
And they sang a new song, saying: "You are worthy to take the scroll, And to open its seals; For You were slain, And have redeemed us to God by Your blood out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation… (Revelation 5:9)
In these examples three Greek words are used: agorazo, which simply means to buy something (Revelation 5:9); lutroo (1 Peter 1:18), and apolutrosis (Ephesians 1:7, Colossians 1:14), which signify the release that occurs upon payment of a ransom price.
The blood of Jesus Christ is both the price God paid to purchase a people for Himself, and the means of liberating those He purchased.
A greater price could not be conceived. In giving His beloved Son to redeem sinners, the Father gave His all. We must then conclude His love for sinners is vast:
In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son [to be] the propitiation for our sins. (1 John 4:10)
A lesser price would never do. From the beginning of the world God made it clear that in His court sin carries the death penalty (Genesis 2:17). It therefore takes a death to atone for sin. It was for this reason that the Son of God was manifest in flesh – to pour out His life in a sin sacrifice on behalf of guilty sinners:
For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? (Hebrews 9:13-14)
