The blood that has redeemed fallen human beings is the blood of Jesus, the Son of God. As human beings, we need genuine human blood for our redemption. Because He was a man, the Lord Jesus could fulfill this requirement. As a man, He shed human blood to redeem fallen human beings. The Lord is also the Son of God, even God Himself. Therefore, with His blood there is the element of eternity, and this element ensures the eternal efficacy of His blood. Therefore, as a man He had genuine human blood, and as God He has the element that gives to His blood eternal efficacy.
First John 1:7 says that “the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.” The name “Jesus” denotes the Lord’s humanity, which was needed for the shedding of the redeeming blood, and the title “His Son” denotes the Lord’s divinity, which is needed for the eternal efficacy of the redeeming blood. Thus, “the blood of Jesus His Son” indicates that this blood is the proper blood of a genuine man for redeeming God’s fallen creatures with the divine surety for its eternal efficacy, an efficacy which is all-prevailing in space and everlasting in time.
The blood the Lord shed on the cross was the blood of Jesus, the Son of God. It was not only the blood of Jesus; it was also the blood of the Son of God. For this reason, the redemption accomplished by the God-man, by the One mingled with God, is eternal.
If the redemption accomplished on the cross was accomplished merely by a man, that redemption could not be eternally effective. Although it might be effective for the redemption of one person, it would not be effective for the redemption of millions of believers. Since a man is limited, a particular man cannot die for millions of others. However, although man is limited, God is not limited. Likewise, although man is temporal, God is eternal. Therefore, in Christ’s redemption there is the eternal and unlimited element of God. This is the reason that in Hebrews 9:12 this redemption is called an eternal redemption.
We need to see that the blood shed by the Lord Jesus on the cross is eternal blood. It is the blood not merely of a man but of a man mingled with the divine element. Hence, this blood, the blood of Jesus, the Son of God, is eternal. In Acts 20:28 Paul had the boldness to speak of this blood as being God’s own blood.
Some of today’s Christians have a concept of God that is very similar to the Jewish concept. The Jewish concept of God is that God is God and that there is no human element in Him. But according to the Bible, the very God in the Old Testament has become the God revealed in the New Testament. In the Old Testament God was merely God, without any human element. But in the New Testament we see the God-man. Through incarnation the God in the Old Testament put on human nature and became the God-man. As such, He became God manifested in the flesh (1 Tim. 3:16).
God became the God-man by being conceived in the womb of a human virgin and then being born of that virgin. In this way the human element was added to His divine element. However, this does not mean that as the God-man the Savior has two persons. No, the Lord Jesus, the Savior, has one person with two natures—the divine nature and the human nature. Although this is very difficult to understand, it is nevertheless a fact revealed in the Bible.
Now we can see that our God is the God revealed in the New Testament and not merely the God as He is revealed in the Old Testament. The Jews, however, have God only as He is seen in the Old Testament. What is the difference between the Jewish God and our God? The difference is that the Jewish God is merely God without a human element, whereas, according to the New Testament, our God is no longer merely God—He is a God-man. Our God has two natures, the divine nature and the human nature. This means that our God, the God-man, is both the complete God and a perfect man. However, He is not two persons; rather, the God-man is one person.
Although we have always believed and taught that the God-man, Jesus Christ, is one person with the divine nature and the human nature and that He is both the complete God and a perfect man, certain opposers have falsely accused us of teaching that Christ was neither fully God nor fully man. They accuse us of saying that the two natures, the divine nature and the human nature, are mingled in Christ to produce a third nature. This accusation is utterly false and baseless, and we repudiate it.
Those who have made this false accusation against us do so by twisting our word in the booklet The Four Major Steps of Christ. In that booklet we say clearly and emphatically that our Savior is both the real God and the true man. Through incarnation neither the divine nature nor the human nature is lost. On the contrary, although the divine and human natures are mingled to form the God-man, both the divine nature and the human nature remain, and a third nature is by no means produced. Although this truth was clearly defined and presented, it was twisted in an evil way in an attempt to accuse us of heresy concerning the Person of Christ. According to the Scriptures, we definitely believe that our Savior, who shed His blood for our redemption, died on the cross as the God-man.