I was enjoying a classical music
CD in the car on Saturday, when I heard the choir sing: "in him is
plenteous redemption" It's a phrase taken from Psalm 130: 7 "O
Israel, hope in the Lord! For with the Lord there is
mercy and loving-kindness, and with Him
is plenteous redemption." I've never thought of redemption as
having a measurable aspect to it before. Redemption is what Christ did for us
on the cross. Psalm 103: 4 says "He redeems me from death and crowns me
with love and tender mercies." and Hebrews 9: 12 says “With his own blood –
not the blood of goats and calves – he entered the Most Holy Place once for all
time and secured our redemption forever.”
In its simplest form redemption is
this: imagine you take something valuable to a pawn shop because you need the
money. The pawn-broker lends you the money, and promises that you can buy back
the object within a certain time-limit, for a particular price. A short time
later you go back to the pawn-broker with the money, and redeem (ie, buy back) the object. It’s
a one-time thing (though of course, you could re-pawn the item and re-redeem it
again several times over). The word 'redeem' originated in the Greek markets and was
about buying slaves. Jesus has bought us and set us free from slavery – we are
redeemed!
But what we are offered is not
just redemption, but plenteous redemption:
plentiful, abundant, copious, overflowing, bounteous, ample, profuse, and
lavish redemption. (Yes, sometimes a Thesaurus can be a wonderful thing!). “God
freely and graciously declares that we are righteous. He did this through Christ
Jesus when he freed us (redeemed us) from the penalty for our sins.” (Romans
3:24)
May God bless you as you ponder
these words.
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