The phrase “once for all” is tremendously important if we are to properly understand the New Covenant and the nature of what Christ accomplished for us through his death and resurrection.
For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit; 1 Peter 3:18 (NASB)
Conversely, Adam’s and Eve’s sin of betrayal of allegiance to God in the garden was also a “once for all” event that forever altered the trajectory of humanity and the entire creation.
20 Against its will, all creation was subjected to God’s curse. But with eager hope, 21 the creation looks forward to the day when it will join God’s children in glorious freedom from death and decay. 22 For we know that all creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Romans 8:20–22 (NLT)
Their choice of Satan over God was a one-time event that brought all successive generations under judgment. What some call the “original sin” resulted in the transmittal of a fallen “sin nature” to every human being who would ever be born the natural way. (Jesus is excluded from this list by reason of the virgin birth.) It set in motion a horrendous sequence of events that is still whirling seemingly out of control today. (However, God is still sovereign over his creation.) The evil we see around us, that sometimes seems to strike the most “innocent” at random, is the result of that first sin reinforced by the additional transgressions that each of us have added to the mix, thus increasing a malevolent avalanche of evil that often sweeps away the unsuspecting. (It is important to remind ourselves that no one is truly innocent before God.)
Since the first sin was a “once for all” event, it stands to reason that what God would eventually do to rescue mankind would also be such an event.
God is “Other”. By that I mean that He is very different from you and me, even though we are created in His image. He is not bound by time as we now are in so many ways. He sees the end from the beginning and “calls those things which be not as though they were”. (Romans 4:17) This amazing merging of history and eternity is revealed in such verses as the following.
And all the people who belong to this world worshiped the beast. They are the ones whose names were not written in the Book of Life, which belongs to the Lamb who was killed before the world was made. Revelation 13:8 (NLT)
If you are a believer, not only did God choose you before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:4), His Son was put to death before history ever began as well.
There is an eternal reality to things before they ever show up in what we call “history”.
History is the playing out of God’s wonderful plan. Shakespeare is credited with writing the following lines which describe how God’s eternal sovereignty works itself out in our world of time and responsibility.
All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts, (As You Like It)
That which is eternal is what is truly important. It might be said that what we do here in the present (the working out of history) is the outworking of the eternal.
12 Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; 13 for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure. Philippians 2:12–13 (NKJV)
How we participate in the outworking in history of God’s eternal purpose affects our eternity. God is sovereign and we are responsible agents. That which from God’s perspective was accomplished before the foundation of the earth had to take place at a given point in history as well. In the “fullness of time” (God’s appointed time), Jesus was born, lived, was crucified, and rose again.
When Jesus hung upon the cross, some eternal things were taking place that we must acknowledge and believe if we are to fully appreciate and benefit from what God did.
Romans says that when Jesus died, we died. When He rose, we rose. We were placed “in Christ” so that what He experienced and accomplished is now ours. We were and are identified with Christ, or, as Paul often wrote, we are “in Christ.” (Click here to read more about this.)
Identification is one of the most important salvation concepts in the Bible. We were not given salvation as much as we were provided a Savior.
We do not receive grace so much as we are now indwelt by the Gracious One. We have not so much been given life as we are filled with the One who is Life Himself. (John 14:6) All the blessings of God are in a Person, and His name is Jesus. (We experience all this via the indwelling Holy Spirit, God’s most amazing gift.)
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, Ephesians 1:3 (NKJV)
When Jesus died on that cross, for those who profess faith in and allegiance to him, He provided forgiveness for every sin that had ever been committed or would ever be committed.
12 but He, having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, SAT DOWN AT THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD, 13 waiting from that time onward UNTIL HIS ENEMIES BE MADE A FOOTSTOOL FOR HIS FEET. 14 For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified. Hebrews 10:12–14 (NASB95)
Does this sound too good to be true? Do not allow the limitations of your human reasoning rob you of a tremendous truth! When the crucifixion took place some 2000 years ago, the sins of every person who would ever live afterward and come to believe the gospel were still in the future. The sins of all those who had previously lived and died while trusting in God were in the past. There is only one way to be made right with God, whenever you were permitted to exist in the thousands of year of human history.
How could the sins of those long dead, such as King David, and the sins of all who would later be born be included in what Jesus did on the cross, unless it was an eternal once-for-all sacrifice?
God, in His eternal wisdom, placed every past and every future sin of His people on His Son. Jesus carried that heavy burden to His death. He substituted for us by taking our punishment for us. Substitution is another big concept. Jesus was our Substitute by paying the price for our sin, but we are identified with Him in that we too died.
God accomplished two huge eternal things on the cross. Jesus died for us, and we died with Him.
His death for us released us from guilt and condemnation. Our death with him released us from the power of sin (Romans 6) and the Law. (Romans 7:4) When He rose again, we rose with Him, which empowered us to live a new life in the Spirit.
Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. 3 For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. Colossians 3:1-4 (NIV)
But let’s get back to our main topic for today, the once for all nature of what Jesus did. The Greek language has more verb forms than English. The past tense can be expressed as the imperfect, which is used for repeated past actions, and the aorist, which is used to communicate a one-time occurrence. An example of this would be: “Johnny practiced (imperfect) on the piano every day with his instructor. Eventually he performed (aorist) his first piece.” What Jesus accomplished on the cross is always expressed in the aorist tense. It was done only once, never to be reenacted. (This is why the Catholic doctrine of the reenactment of Christ’s death in the Mass is so horribly unbiblical.) Here is how the author of Hebrews put it.
Nor did he enter heaven to offer himself again and again, like the earthly high priest who enters the Most Holy Place year after year to offer the blood of an animal. 26 If that had been necessary, he would have had to die again and again, ever since the world began. But no! He came once for all time, at the end of the age, to remove the power of sin forever by his sacrificial death for us. Hebrews 9:25-26 (NLT)
In other words, what Jesus did was permanent and eternal.
When we confess our sins and ask forgiveness from God, we tap into that once for all past work of grace on the cross.
Since His death was “once for all” and it took care of the power of sin “forever,” then our salvation is also “once for all”.
Once for all time he took blood into that Most Holy Place, but not the blood of goats and calves. He took his own blood, and with it he secured our salvation forever. Hebrews 9:12 (NLT)
God permanently transferred us out of the kingdom of darkness into his kingdom of light and life. (Colossians 1:13-14) He caused us to pass from death to life with the result being we will never ever come under condemnation again.
“I tell you the truth, those who listen to my message and believe in God who sent me have eternal life. They will never be condemned for their sins, but they have already passed from death into life. John 5:24 (NLT)
God removed us from the treadmill of needing to “earn” our salvation or right standing with God through our performance and placed us “in Christ,” where the work is finished.
Our Lord Jesus paid the penalty for our failures to keep the Covenant before we ever committed them. He actually “became” our sins, and, when he rose again, we became the righteousness of God in him.
God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. 2 Corinthians 5:21 (NIV)
When he rose again, all forgiven former covenant breakers entered a right relationship with God and passed from death to life and from darkness to light.
We participated in his death and resurrection through identification. It is impossible for us to go back into death and “unbecome” a born-again child of God. Christ’s death and resurrection were “once for all” and so is the resultant new birth and justification. We are now “one spirit” with God. (1 Corinthians 6:17) He lives his life in and through us. (Galatians 2:20) Now God is working in us both to “will and to do” of his good pleasure as we cooperate with his grace. (Philippians 2:12-13) This ought to make us shout for joy!
To read more articles on the amazing new covenant, click here.
